What an absolutely fantastic evening! My first run as trainer and I couldn't have wished for a better group of people or tasks!

Our planned task for tonight was to help local project APE to give St Paul's Adventure Playground a bit of a makeover, but with such a wonderful turn out we were again able to send a small group off to help our good friend Raluca spread mulch at Malago Berry Maze. Much mulch was spread and to cap a dream night, our very own mattock man was immediately assigned the task of smashing up bricks. Massive thanks to Dave for leading the berry party.

After a shortish run through Riverside park the playground group arrived at the playground to find that Guy and Rachel had done an Ape'ic job of preparing tasks for us. We had sanding, metal rail painting, shutter painting, fence painting, leaf collecting, litter picking and .... wait for it ... Trampoline Building! As a result all 25 of us were instantly being productive and enjoying the massive variety of work.

After 35 mins of activity we had loads of multi-coloured fence panels, lovely red metal work, gorgeous yellow shutters, sanded posts ready for painting, a forecourt clear of leaves and a trampoline base assembled. In fact the most difficult part of the evening was getting everyone to leave!

Special mention to Richard who managed to paint his fence posts with one contact lens, Ed and Richard for some amazing sanding work, Ned and Liam for rail painting and newcomer Petra for her amazing leaf collection efforts. And of course to the whole fence panel and trampoline team!

We managed a group photo and dashed off - there was even just enough time for trampoline engineer Kerry to try the zip line. We'll be back!

On return to base I shamelessly got the lead group into plank position on the basis that I wanted to call this run Plank-it of the Ape but then Fi came up with the much better pun above - sorry folks (not really sorry, it's good for your core!).

Finally, Anna did an excellent job of setting up a posed APE (and made a very convincing exclamation mark).

We've been doing a few double tasks recently and it's fantastic that we can help even more projects. It's only possible though because you lovely people keep coming along! You're all legends!

Thanks Jack for leading the second group. Clo and Matt for back marking and lastly but definitely not leastly, thanks Emma for suggesting this task!

Tuesday’s spring-blessed run saw 31 GoodGymmer’s head back to Emmaus (pronounced Em-May-Us!) in Stokes Croft for a bit of lifting and shifting in their enormous furniture warehouse.

Emmaus provides both work and a home for 23 people who were previously homeless. Emmaus’ story is a fascinating one, and we were given a brief history of how they were founded as well as their aims and principles by Xanne when we arrived. If you’ve got a few minutes, you can find out more about their history on the Emmaus website.

Emmaus is a social enterprise and one of their sources of income is selling furniture and other household items that are donated by the public. Their warehouse is crammed to the rafters full of goodies and what they needed was some willing labour to shift things about and help create some Emmaus’ing space.

Any ideas we had of admiring what was in stock were quickly shelved as we embraced our first logistical challenge. With teamwork and brute force, we first cleared some industrial shelving units of their groaning mass, before dismantling them and moving them to another part of the warehouse. Emmaus had set aside a week for just one guy to do the job, we managed to do it in 30 minutes! The rest of the team also took to sorting brick-a-brac and books lifting more pages like an over-excited Harry Potter fanatical octopus in possession of a new JK Rowling novel in an active wind tunnel.

After re-assembling the shelves and making sure they were re-stacked, we took stock of our achievement and we were thanked for a good night’s work.

We then headed off to Queen Square where Gary took us through the usual array of fitness stuff, before deciding then to replenish ourselves with a cool drink. So then, as Shelvis Presley would say, thank you very much!

Thanks to Darren for writing the report and Alice for the pun. Hope you don't mind my little octopus addition, can't miss an opportunity for a simile.

In an hour of need, when all appeared lost, a team of fearless runners clad in red took on a 5k run to transform unwanted business waste into useful, crafty items for kids to play and create with at the Children's Scrapstore.

The group amassed under the still shining sun brought by the ever growing days. Laughs and chatter abound despite the daunting task at hand, these brave souls were not letting any worries slip into their minds. Even the fresh faces of the group were confident. Before long the introductions were complete, we knew names, group leaders and back markers, all that was left was to hit the road on the 2.5k run to our task.

WHOOSH!!!

Faster than a hyperactive bat's wing flapping in a hurricane we arrived to the welcome of our hosts Kelly and Lucy. The news was broken to us that we would not packing newsletters tonight...

KAAA-BLAM!!!!

Our hosts then broke out a list of task that would need to be done. The list was long but well structured, like an army of leaf cutter ants transporting identical sections of palm leaf over the Forth Road Bridge. Crack teams picked a task that best suited their super powers. New runner Ceri and Kim sorted nets so fast they could have captured Poseidon.

SWOOOOSH!!!!

Others were cutting ropes with their specialist fabric melting powers, slicing through pipes with saws and pincers like ninja lobsters. The bobbin team were poetry in motion as the sliced thread from the bobbins creating webs and beards as they worked. It was a crate effort from the lads on the zip tying team and another team were certainly de-boxing clever.

WHAZUMPH!!!

In no time I was announcing that time was running out. Our heroes held their heads high, heeded the call and set to work finishing their task in hand and some even assisted others to ensure everything was complete. Filing cabinets were moved, and tools were returned. We assembled for a celebratory group photo complete with random scrappy accessories, were thanked by the wonderful ladies from the Scrapstore and headed back to Queen Square.

ZOOOOOMMM!!!!

Faster than you could say "jumping jilikers scrapman" we were back and completing some strength exercises to prepare us for more running and devious tasks to come. We stretched and punned like pros before heading off back to our very own Bat Cave in Vivo.

It was truly a story of the underdogs taking on the impossible this evening but all of you brave souls who dared to run and volunteer are an inspiration to all. You used your evening for good and for that you are all heroes, even if you don't wear bright yellow pants and own a fancy car that farts fire.

THE END