Four Goodgymmers had to turn their back on a night at St Mark's Church after some overzealous Council officers stole their task from them mere minutes away from their arrival.

Theft in cold blood

Raj and Gramps, our running crew for the evening, were just about to set off to task when a bird chirped in Gramps' ear that our task for the evening might have just been cruelly stolen from under us.

Undeterred, our running crew took a detour to the location of the task just to double check and St Mark's Church had never looked cleaner! Turns out that when our assistance was requested to help as the outside of the church had become an ice rink with the frost and fallen leaves, the Council had also taken notice and cleared the mess of their volition. Credit to them, I suppose.

Our Goodgymmers, now joined by Niamh and Veronika, decided to find themselves another job and before you could say 'it's colder than a leaf-sweepers bum out here,' they were at the Noel Park Children's Centre, clearing the courtyard of leaves.

In a task described variously and unironically, as 'the best task ever,' our Goodgymmers swept, laughed, joked, and frolicked to their heart's content before a number of them decided to check notes jump in their car and get back home. It takes all sorts, sometimes, to rescue a win from the jaws of certain defeat. Boom.

Come next week!

5 Goodgymmers proved they weren't afraid of the dark by lending a hand at a very spookily lit Floyde's Garden on a lovely, wet autumn night.

The turning of the worm

The good folk at Floyde's Garden are having some work done, creating a paving area to frame a whole bunch of new natural planting. However, the ground was chockablock with a multitude of very illegal and very aromatic three cornered leeks that needed to be dug up.

Our Goodgymmers brought their own lights as the proper pros they are and were on their knees even before slow ol' Gramps had a chance to do a proper risk assessment. Ain't nobody got time for that.

Conversation on the night included weighing the benefits of wild foraging against the use of fox urine as a cooking ingredient, the likelihood of finding Lord Lucan in one of the many holes we dug up, the futility of life expressed quite dramatically by the unnamed Goodgymmer who attempted to use a rusty paint stripper and a screwdriver in place of a trowel, and one of our regulars spent most of her evening engaged in very one-sided chat with every single worm we dug up. It takes all sorts.

Join Dave and Latoya at Traid next week for more fun and games!

Tonight as I ran to Goodgym I thought about the path I was taking and how unsafe it seemed.

I only ran 3k but that path through the park that I only ran to get some extra distance in, looked dangerous because I'm alone.

If I had been with the Goodgym crew doing it, I wouldn't think about about it but, as a woman on her own it was a thought.

Loving to run on the road the concerns should be, not getting so caught up in your pace you forget crossing properly and if it's dark wear visible clothing and possibly a head torch.

Unfortunately this is not the only worry for women. We want to run home from work, get that training in after work or take that path that seemed safe when the sun was out.

This is why in Haringey tonight we were happy to support the This Girl Can Lift The Curfew campaign.

We didn't have far to go to our task and so got a bit of fitness session in before taking a nice jog over to the Community Hub.

We were needed to continue painting the room that had been started the week before.

Sam and Paul got into some up the ladder down the ladder and painted a column white. Whilst Rebecca, Louise and Julie gave the back wall a second coat of yellow.

Niamh arrived to help finish off the tasks and as usual we accomplished more than what the beneficiary thought we could.

This only left the fitness session to finish off the night.

Goodgym Haringey vets knew what was in store when Sally was mentioned but for some such as Paul, it will be something I'm sure we'll hear about tomorrow.

With Moby now silent it was time to call it a night. Whilst some headed home, some went to enjoy the rest of their Halloween night.

Another afternoon, another bed (and mattress) for Anne and I to relocate for disposal - amongst the many that we've confronted this year, today's proved right up there in the physical challenge stakes, simply because mattress manufacturers don't put handles at the ends (a fundamental design flaw)...and this one proved particularly difficult to grip and move, so we shuffled it along the corridor into the lift as best we could, with occasional stops for laughter or to catch our breath.

Once in the lift we somehow found ourselves trapped on the wrong side of it, with neither of us initially able to reach the button to send it to the ground floor...

Fortunately the divan base and headboard proved a little easier to manage, and after a few more journeys along Ms B's corridor with our hands full of bed, we soon had all the parts downstairs, and after another quick breather, got them to the outside refuse area and squeezed it all into the space where the council would come to collect.

6 Goodgymmers gave it a good go at painting a really large ceiling at the Community Hub in Wood Green.

Hitting The Ceiling

They say they didn't paint the Sistine Chapel in one day and if it took Michelangelo 4 years for a little paint job in Italy, you can't help but be impressed at the amount of ceiling our Goodgymmers covered in the space of an hour in good ol' Wood Green. But I'm jumping the gun here a bit. Let's rewind.

Raj and Paul met Gramps at Blue House Yard for the evening's run while Julie, Ed, and Niamh opted for the walk/cycle to task option.

Once we arrived, we were pleased to find that the team at the Hub - led by Laurie - had already been at work, taping up edges and painting the most awkward bits of ceiling work so that we could just get on with a bit of painting.

Armed with rollers, some of our team tried to outdo each other with war stories of DIYs past but very soon, they were all brought to the same level by the reality of painting a ceiling the size of a small pacific island country.

Ignoring back pain and neck cricks, our Goodgymmers put their heart and soul into this paint job. Heck, one of our Goodgymmers even managed to paint some of her own hair onto the ceiling. Eat your heart out, Michelangelo.

Alas, there's only so much you can do in an hour and we had to miss a corner of the room. Luckily, Laurie and the rest of the team were staying behind and assured us the job would be finished on the night.

We're back at the Hub next week to crack on with the wall painting. Join us. The more, the merrier.

A ninja squad comprised of Fantastic 4 braved the hills and the elements as they made their way to the Stroud Green and Harringay Library this Wednesday #LoveYourLibrary

Unbeleafable, Jeff

Our four Goodgymmers made their way to the Stroud Green and Harringay Library on an unseasonably warm evening, pregnant with the constant menace of imminent rain. Undeterred, our Goodgymmers met with Peter from the Friends Group who had arranged an array of rakes and brushes for us, ready to clear the library's emergency pathways from a slippery blanket of dead leaves.

Under a rapidly disappearing huge moon, we brushed and palmed and bagged the leaves, making the emergency entrance safe again as clouds gathered threateningly above us.

Before you knew it, the skies cracked open upon us and Peter, happy with our handiwork, released us into the night early. We took advantage of the unexpected boon of unscheduled time to take our good do-good-get-fit-selves to the pub where we imbibed the wares of the land as we reminisced on a yet unwatched Soviet retelling of a beloved classic.

In short, we got drenched sweeping leaves and dried up a bit at the pub innit. Standard.

Join us next week for the first of a few painting sessions at the Community Hub.