26 Camdenitonians braved the evening to go and help Highgate Newton Community Centre have a good old tidy up yesterday.

We started the night by welcoming ex New Yorker Justin who has previously run a marathon and felt he'd better get back in shape before his second child arrived. Bonus points to Justin for having to run past his house twice last night. He didn't even try to stop for a cup of tea (or come to think of it, invite us in - this has all been noted).

Then we congratulated Patrick Luong, who, on this last day of September, joined us to embark on his 31st good deed of the month. That's 1.033 good deeds a day! Word on the street is he's going to have a day off in October since there are 31 rather than 30 days in that month.

Since the run was a bit longer than usual we split into two groups for the journey up: those fancying a faster run and those fancying a good old natter. The Ax Man led the speedsters and Simon the rest. We discussed a few bits and bobs on the way up, including why it was called "Highgate" (it's high up) and whether or not there was a "Lowgate" (still don't know). At one point we considered getting a bus, but instead soldiered on and arrived all in one piece and vertical at the centre.

Our delightful host Catharine was full of beans and greeted us with water and biscuits (biscuits? At a Camden run?) when we arrived. Rehydrated and fuelled we discovered that because of the longer run we didn't have very much time to spend at the task - a mere 15 minutes. No problem there, we'd just have to work extra fast. We spread ourselves out and de-weeded cracks, gaps, nooks, crannies and crevices and when our time was up it was clear we'd done a bit of good.

It was back into two groups for the run home (well, back to Bob). Ax's fast group seemed to further divide up as everybody had a blast depending on how much they liked hills. In Simon's group we enjoyed some fast downhill running, some Indian File action and played a game of secret surges.

Next week we're tidying up Somers Town Estate. A shorter run this time and plenty of action planned. See you there,

Simon