Today's mission introduced me to Bryon, who has been a GoodGym-er since 2013 (and so is consequently a totally awesome human being). Our task was to help tidy-up Mrs M's garden, including to cut and clear some grass and to trim plants.

Whatever visions I had of performing some genteel gardening this morning were quickly abandoned when we arrived and discovered that the large patch of green to be attacked was in fact weeds and not grass. This also meant that my dream of using a lawnmower on a mission without something going wrong will have to be realised another day (this is seriously one of my current life goals).

Earlier in the year, a friend of Mrs M's had been able to clear a patch of the weeds and place a black weed-suppressing sheet on top. It seemed that the sheet was pretty good at doing its job, so the new plan was to clear another patch of weeds (and eventually the whole garden) and cover the whole thing with another sheet.

Purely by luck, we started digging into the weeds in line with the original patch before realising that this was also a Good Idea. Time passed by quickly as we chatted about London theatre and exchanged tips on getting cheap tickets/decent seats (My top tip is to ask for free upgrades when you collect your tickets. Bryon's is to go for day tickets/the lottery system when the box office opens).

By the time we left, we'd managed to clear a decent size of weeds (about 2 bags worth in 1.5 hours), which worked out to exactly one weed-suppressing sheet in terms of area. Fortunate happenstances like this please me. We also packed some existing garden waste into another black bag and took them all towards the bins for later disposal.

Mrs M seemed really pleased with the patch we'd dug and offered us some refreshments. Unfortunately we couldn't stay any longer to enjoy her kind offer, but hopefully the next GoodGym-ers will be able to take advantage of her wonderful hospitality 😄