James and Dharmesh cycled in to the Food Bank, Keith arrived on foot, Linda was doubling as a driver so had came by car.

Two members who had signed up did not show up which can be irritating but James, Linda and Dharmesh are old hands at this and less people are using the food bank at the moment so being depleted in numbers did not matter so much. Pretty soon over 30 loads were bagged up and the subsequent box breaking completed. We also had the added bonus of Keith signing up at the last minute and arriving in time to help out with the admin to allocate drivers. Apart from a last minute juice distribution which was knocking on its sell by date everything went very smoothly.

Well done everyone

Good gym Redbridge were back at the food bank today. A mixture of old and new faces were there to pack the bags. We're obviously getting good at good at this we were speeding along the shelves like supermarket sweep getting the packages ready and finished everything in a record time.

Even monsoon type weather won’t keep GoodGym Redbridge away from their regular stint at the Mutual Aid Food Bank. James cycled in and Yasmin tried to run until the rain blocked her sight. Both suffered so much from wet feet that they no choice but to take their shoes and socks off and do the shift barefoot.

First missions can be very daunting so it was great to see that Manjula had not only braved the elements by walking in but also overcame any first time nerves and was soon in the swing of things, along with our relatively newbie AJ they were picking and packing like pros. Welcome to GoodGym Manjula.

The change to earlier time had thrown Dharmesh and Linda out as they had pre-booked an early outdoor swim so they turned up a hour later than the others ironically looking a lot drier than those who hadn’t been swimming in the rain. They both quickly got stuck in with helping out the packers.

As always the organised chaos, rustling, jostling, grafting and generally joking about gradually smoothed it’s self out to neat piles of shopping. Keith and some others assisted with taking shopping out to the cars and we’re rewarded with getting very wet for their trouble. Linda sidled off to help Yasmin break up the boxes in order to stay busy in the dry, while James kept one of the helpers little boy busy by pretending to be shot several times over.

Last but by no means least we couldn’t let this task go by without marking our Peter’s 600th good deed. As usual he had been making himself very useful throughout the session, making sure the packers had everything they needed and packing a couple of batches himself. Always dependable, practical and hardworking (and now pretending to be embarrassed by all the praise) a real asset to GG Redbridge…and sometimes Hackney. Well done Peter.

It was great to see everyone together after lockdown and lovely to welcome Keith and Suzy to the group. Well done to those of us who ran the Parkrun route before the picnic and to little Lottie the pup for getting a personal best. 😀

The weather smiled on us and we managed to enjoy an elaborate picnic with alcohol free Prosecco and caterpillar cake taste-testing before the heavens opened again. Jury is still out on whether Colin or Cecil is best, although James' vegan sausage rolls were a hit and Lottie enjoyed the chicken legs. 🤣