After a late message to see if anyone else wanted to join us, it was great to end up having ten of us at the task!

We welcomed Bronya and Lucy for the first time, and Leah and Jess for their first GoodGym session for a while.

Ben led us out down the High St for a slightly longer route to Sanctus, and we arrived to our task surprisingly sweaty for a November evening.

Our lovely task owner Sarah showed us the hallway and toilet that could do with a fresh coat of paint, ready for Sanctus' Christmas meal in a few weeks. As we had such a large group, some of the team painted and some gave the chairs and tables a good scrub.

Richard E showed off his professionalism by giving the high corners a quick dust with a paintbrush, whilst the others went straight for pouring paint out. After speaking to Sarah about how many people Sanctus support everyday and seeing the cleaning team working hard, I returned to the painting area to find that Ben had somehow shut Jane, Jess, and Richard P in the toilet, but this clearly helped as they managed to get the whole room finished.

Whilst the last areas of painting and cleaning up were finished, Sarah showed a few of us round and told us more about everything Sanctus does for those who need its help. A great charity and task, and we look forward to returning!

Refreshing to have some different energy in the group this evening, everyone actually wanted to do the same way back to ARU to get a bit more distance in!

Next week, we have leaflet preparations at The Oddfellows.

Also, let's not all be TOO jealous of Sallyann going to San next week.

See you all soon,

Laurie

We met up and discussed the latest football results (2-1 Chelsea being second to 3-1 Ipswich). Ben became the responsible adult and said we should set off to make Fay's target time of arrival. So we did!

Speeding down the high street it was lovely to see the christmas decorations out just in the nick of time - they get turned on in mid-November. We posed with them to ensure Fay was rage filled. Martin may escape as he is still basking in the glory of leading the quiz team to glory on Sunday.

Arriving at Hearing Help, Sallyann and Fay weren't even there! They shortly arrived in matching red jackets after we asked the lovely Sarah what we were painting.

In the fading light we gave the old painters a new lease of life. Hopefully they look ok in daylight! Andy actually had a use for once, shining the headtorch while nattering and not doing any work. Who knows. And hopefully Ben didn't get too much paint on the ground...

We headed back over the new bridge to base and parted ways after confirming Parkrun volunteer date later this month! Come along!

As Sam Ryder was in town this morning doing some busking we thought there might be a chance he could join us this evening, unfortunately he couldn't make it 🤷🏼‍♂️, but we did have our very own Russell join us instead. Which is actually better... and on that note.

With the threat of rain, 6 of us set off from HQ towards the springfield basin for a spot of litter picking. Meeting Fay and Sallyann there we broke into 2 groups and set about picking to our hearts galore. Somehow Andy and Russell ended up in the same group...and began to chat, and chat, and chat 😂

In my group, Ben posed for a majestic photo atop of a large boulder, Richard spoke like a true proud father about his daughter's parkrun pb and Jen told us about her epic charity walking adventure next year.

We regrouped along the route and continued down towards the lock. Took some group photos before heading back. Thanks for coming guys, We've made alittle piece of Chelmsford a bit nicer.

until next time

RUN HAPPY

Rich

Whoop whoop it's the sound of the GoodGym!

Time for another run, arriving on a warm summer eve and greeting Nicola, we had a chat and I'd planned a nice circular route to be led by Jane. We headed off into the light night. Hopefully Mohammed's leg will heal up soon and he can get back to running with us! He has a parkrun PB to attempt!

We chatted as we ran (of course) , Erin lamenting that her days of being able to attend multiple raves a weekend have passed her by, Joel lamenting he didn't have a million pounds in cash to spend on a house, and Ben not lamenting at all that he is going to Switzerland next week!

Superb job there everyone, Pastor Chris was very impressed and grateful at the amount we did, and that we survived the flesh wounds from all the brambles. Any excuse for me to wield an excessively sized scythe is always good.

Fay headed back to meet us at the gym and we set off. She called the police en route about a broken down car on a bend. Another good deed done.

Although we dwindled in numbers on the route back we still had strong appetite for cake, which Andy had clearly home made. Jane even took one home for Rich and he was kind enough to send a photo (NSFW) of him enjoying it. No good deed for that.

Can we promise cake next week? You never know! (But you defo got spoiled this first run, Nicola!)