Ah, the dark Walpole Park in winter, a fleet of wheelbarrows, and the usual suspects with head torches, shovels, spades and rakes. Sounds familiar? Another trip to the Walled Garden, a path surface that needed refreshing and the scent of... woodchip? Or maybe something else?

Tonight's task was the second part of the 2025 edition of replacing woodchip on the Walled Garden path, so we've been doing a fair amount of digging, wheelbarrow runs, shovelling, and raking. Certainly not weeding, which in turn was the speciality of other visitors to the park garden - a different kind of weeding.

When walking with wheelbarrows past Rickyard, each time we heard party tunes. Did the Christmas miracle come early, transforming Walpole Park into a nightclub? Everyone seemed to be having fun - and so did we! With a small, but powerful team of four: Harvey, Steph, Sevan and Kash, we've finished off the job in no time! Now we're getting ready for the start of 2026, kicking off the group runs with another session at Walpole Park - sign up now!

Ms E had been through incredibly tough times that culminated in a long-term hospitalisation. Her plans to renovate the patio and the materials bought for that purpose became the last thing to worry about. When Ms E returned home, the garden she had known was no longer there. Instead, there was an uninviting portal that led to an impenetrable wall of brambles. Behind the curtain of spikes lay Outworld - once a beautiful and peaceful place until it became overtaken by brambles.

Ms E summoned two warriors from Ealingrealm to fight the invaders in a deadly tournament to protect her home from being conquered by thorns from Bramblerealm. She had only one pair of shears; the other was probably a victim of a bramble conspiracy. But that would not stop Sevan and Kash.

Kash went first through the portal with a pair of Ms E's shears and immediately entered berserk mode, snipping, cutting, and chopping everything in her way. Sevan bravely entered the portal with bare gloves and plastic bin bags. He meticulously captured the defeated brambles and put them into sacks, which was not easy as even the cut brambles fought back, hooking to Sevan's clothes with their spikes.

The warriors had limited time, as it was the shortest day of the year, to win the tournament. They had to knock the brambles out for good. With the help of Amphibian, whom they'd rescued on the way, and a newly discovered rake, Sevan and Kash pressed on and eventually reached the brick wall at the far side of the arena.

When the sun set and the rain came, the battle was over. The surviving brambles retreated to the left side of the arena. Everyone was certain that the light would return to Outworld and to Ms E's garden the following day.

Arriving at Miss M's flat and peering in through the front door, to Kash and Sevan it looked packed with stuff. Good thing that they were on a mission to declutter and take donations to a local charity shop.

At first, a set of bags were ready on the landing for donation, filled with clothes and bags. Miss M said that this would be all for today as the bags were heavy. The mission description had said something about heavy books too though, so Sevan asked if there was more to help with. There was, so Kash and Sevan explained that they had the time to do more for Miss M today and she decided to prepare another batch for when Kash and Sevan returned.

The mission was originally listed for 2 or 3 GoodGymers and on the way to the charity shop, the duo found a woman with skates who took some of the weight off them. The now trio speedily made it to Fara and their donations were gratefully received.

For the second round, the donations were more eclectic. Miss M had found a pressure cooker, some curling tongs that historians would be interested in, a saw (not donateable), clothes and more bags. There were also 3 heavy boxes full of books that Sevan helped lift out of the hallway cupboard. Those 3 steps to the cupboard were as far as he or Kash went into the flat during the mission.

The first box from the cupboard was full of novels and the next 2 were a bit lighter and full of... handbags! Miss M could've started her own handbag shop as Sevan estimated that they may have donated 40 of them during the mission. Another quick run to the charity shop with the second set of unnecessary items left the charity shop workers and Miss M very happy.

Today was the last Junior parkrun before Xmas and Santa had come to town early. There was lots of fancy dress on show at Pitshanger Juniors from the volunteers and also the runners 🤶⛄🎅.

Steph, Harvey and Sevan spread Xmas cheer as marshals, encouraging the runners around the course and making sure they made it around safely. At the other end of the naughty-nice spectrum, tail walkers Kash and Maria turned one little girl into the Grinch 👹.

The girl didn't want to complete the course, didn't want to be spoken to and didn't want to be followed by the tail walkers, which is difficult as that's the whole point of their role. She was being a bit mean and definitely not in the Christmas spirit. Maybe she has tail walker phobia? Her grandma said that the child would drop out, so the tail walkers passed her, then 15 minutes later, she was still working her way around the course. After reaching the funnel, Kash went to find the grouchy child and carefully supported them to get to the finish.