Having already skipped ahead to Christmas in our last report, we decided to travel back in time for a slightly more seasonal opening question – what’s your favourite thing to do at Halloween? Perhaps not surprisingly, the most popular response was eating the Trick or Treat sweets…there may even be people among us who buy the sweets and then turn out all the lights on Halloween to stop children knocking at the door. If that unfortunate event does happen, we got some top tips from Andrew on scaring them off, witch we all duly noted!

With all this sweet eating on the horizon, it’s even more important than ever to keep active and we are all out and about getting competitive as Beat the Street fever hits Swindon. Beat the Street is a fun, free game with the aim of seeing how far you can walk, cycle and run in just 6 weeks. Over 15,0000 miles have been clocked up in just two weeks, and with our fervent studying of the Beat the Street map before every run, GoodGym has been doing its bit to add to this total. Mike, King of the Puns has all the Beat the Street deets if you want to know more.

Cards at the ready for some beat boxing en route, the walking group of Emma the Trainer, Karen, Yvie and Dominque, and the running group, with backmarker Charles handily attired in hi-vis, headed off to the Haven Day Centre for Swindon Night Shelter.

Becky and Carol at Swindon Night Shelter are always super-organised and had a list of jobs ready for us when we arrived. The last time we visited was on our first birthday and it was good to be back and see how much progress has been made since August. But there is always more to do so we quickly split into groups and got started – after a quick reminisce about our fabulous birthday run and Alexander Kenmure’s snazzy socks!

Lily and Helen started with jumper sorting before heading outside for bramble cutting and weeding, with Hannah also joining the gardening gang. For the rest of us, it was a classic GoodGym task – why lift weights in a gym when you can lift things that really need lifting like seats? We’d soon swapped all the folding chairs for the smart banquet chairs donated by a local wedding venue – a case of to love and to chairish? Run Leader Sam perfected the chair lift and with that job in the bag, it was time to tackle the big job…moving the cupboard. For those who are frequent visitors to the Haven, this is not the first time we have moved the cupboard and we know from experience that this is not a job for the faint hearted. It was time to call on the spirit of the Chuckle Brothers…and with a lot of “to me, to you” and some heavy lifting from Mike and Charles, the cupboard was moved to its final (well, maybe) resting place.

Last but not least, there was yet another opportunity for a photo of Dave on his own. Well, not on his own but with a table tennis table...perhaps not quite what he was hoping for in a quest to not be snapped on his lonesome! We’re not quite sure how this happens every week – we promise we do talk to him! Watch this space for a new series of Dave with friends in the coming weeks!

After a quick group photo, in which Jo was unfortunately hidden by a bunch of flowers, it was time to head back to base to hone those essential chatting and coffee drinking skills in preparation for our next visit to We’re Open on Thursday. And if you want even more GoodGym in your life then check out what’s coming up:

Community Mission to build a play house on Saturday 19th October

Group Run to Men in Sheds on Tuesday 22nd October

Trust10 at Avebury on Sunday 27th October – last Trust10 of the year, and Helen’s first trail 10k!

The September sun was shining strongly as we arrived at the Oasis but the talk was all about the changing of the seasons. Would this be the first run that we’d need lights for? Would anyone remember their lights? Would any of the lights be charged up? And having all bought the same chest light last winter, how long would it be before we were once again all confused about who owns which light?

We’d like to enlighten you further, but were called to order by Emma the Trainer asking us to introduce ourselves and reveal our favourite thing about autumn. And would you beleaf it…for most of us it was crunching through crispy leaves, though there were a couple of votes for woolly jumpers and sitting by a roaring fire too – and for the more energetic, the excitement of the race season and running in the dark! Sounds like we are all ready for the nights to start drawing in – but with Beat the Street about to start, there’ll be plenty of opportunity for crunching though leaves and getting out and about in the crisp autumn air.

We split into our Speedy, led by Emma and backmarked by Sam, and Steady, led by Charles and backmarked by Lily, groups and started our run to the Swindon Women’s Aid Refuge. The refuge provides accommodation for female victims of domestic violence; there are 22 units of self-contained accommodation to suit the needs of single females or those with children, as well as communal areas so that residents can meet up and socialise.

Our tasks were to improve the garden area and clear the bike shed, which was being used to store a lot of things other than bikes. We split into teams with Jason and Stuart powering into action with the mower and strimmer, once Karen, Alethia,Yvie and Moe had cleared the grass area of picnic benches and toys. Sheddy to spring into action on a Swindon classic hump and dump task, were the shed clearers David, Helen, Ciaran, Tom, Lily and Charles – team work makes the dream work, and order was soon restored. Mission accompliSHED! And out in the garden, Richard and Sam’s shear determination made light work of cutting back a hedge, while Hannah, Tracey and Jo attacked the weeds with a vengeance.

But the Alan Titchmarsh award for the night goes to Teresa for the magnificent cutting of a new border with an almost straight edge!

In amongst all this hard work, there still seemed to be an opportunity for some of the crew to nip off behind the bike shed for…well, let’s save the blushes and leave that there. For now, anyway! And let’s move on to the obligatory photo call...

Quite a lively one this week as a slug and snail infested cone was waved over Tracey’s head – well, it’s one way to guarantee a Tracey funny face! And she snailed it!

And with that we headed back to the Oasis, under the setting sun and wishing that we had brought lights after all. But we all had a warm glow knowing that we had completed a task that will make a real difference; a great task and made even more special by being another 50th celebration – congratulations Charles! - and part of the GoodGym 10th anniversary week.

There’s lots more coming up, so for those who aspire to being part of the swish black top gang, get yourselves signed up!

#GG10 Super Saturday Tidy Up at St. Mary's Church, Lydiard Tregoze – Straight after parkrun (well, straight after parkrun coffee), join the GoodGym 10th anniversary event

Weeding in the garden at ChristChurch – this task is walkable!

This week’s getting-to-know-you question turned out to be a real conundrum for us all, the “young ones” and the young at heart – what is our favourite Cliff Richard song?! This was harder than it may seem, as most of us had not heard of Cliff Richard or his antics on a big red bus and the connection to tonight’s task was somewhat lost! But we persevered and were soon splitting into Speedies led by Emma and backmarked by Paul, and the Steadies led by run leader Charles and backmarked by Jo.

For this week’s task we were headed to The Big Yellow Bus project. The project was launched by Gerry Watkins in 2017 and is run by volunteers of the community for the community and is aimed at tacking homelessness by converting double decker buses that can accommodate people overnight. This is the second local bus, the first one already up and running in nearby Cirencester. This was a slightly cooler evening and it’s not hard to see why there is such a drive to get the bus up and running for the winter months when it is particularly hard for those without a home.

We were met there by Jason, and Hannah who probably has the most epic story about how she broke her toe that has ever been told… but not for here!

Run leader Charles had visited the bus the day before and we’ll take his word for it that it had been transformed from its previous white to the lovely canary yellow colour that greeted us when we arrived! So we lined up for our group shot in front of one of the best photo backdrops we’ve had so far. We had to try really hard not to lean against it as the paint was still a bit damp! Stuart was particularly worried about getting yellow paint on his shiny new black GoodGym shirt. But not to fear, GoodGym Swindon number one fan Jo’s mum is always on hand for paint removing tips!

Our mission was to clean the inside of the bus which is in the process of being converted into a living and sleeping space. Downstairs there is a seating area, wood burner and cooking facilities and upstairs there are 9 sleeping areas. So we set to work with cloths and brooms and sprays and Henry the Hoover. This was one of the more challenging cleaning tasks we’ve had, not because the bus was particularly dirty, but the stairs and beds and doors all had to be navigated. It was nice to see that we’d left the bus looking a bit more shiny than when we’d arrived.

Oh, we do love a good photo at GoodGym Swindon and a few of us couldn’t resist sitting in the driver’s seat for a pose. Gina looked particularly happy to be at the big wheel of fun!

Gerry had us all captivated with his passion and energy for all things Big Yellow Bus Project. He can certainly draw a crowd and this will surely help him with his dream to get enough support to launch the bus this winter. As the time went on there were less and less people on the bus and more and more people listening to his master plan!! We wish him and his supporters lots of luck with this venture.

Next up in our calendar is Gardening at Ferndale Primary School. We will be walking and running approximately 3km in total to Ferndale Primary School and back, to help with a gardening task. The outdoor area is entirely managed by volunteers and they need some help with an ongoing garden project. We have been here before and a lot has been done so far but there is more to do, so don't delay, sign up here!.

A change of plan this week meant we were able to return to the STEAM Museum to finish a weeding task we’d started back in July. We were joined by newbies Cath, Jo, Karen and Yvonne. We think they fit splendidly into the GoodGym family – read on to find out why!

After much super sleuthing the day before, a crack team deduced this was the last group run that our lovely run leader Sandy Sam would be attending before her wedding!

So we formed a rather unconventional bunch of hens and presented her with a bouquet and veil and announced that there would be post-run cake to celebrate her upcoming nuptials to Adam. We are clearly lacking in the sleuthing as she will be back next week – more cake anyone?

The getting-to-know-you question was what our chosen superpower would be! Emma the Trainer would have COMPLETE silence when she is doing parkrun directing (of course!), Sharon would be able to repair any broken joints (horse or human – handy!) and Jo would choose mind control (eek!).

The runners led by Sandy Sam and backmarked by Stuart, and the walkers led by Jo all arrived at STEAM in no time. It’s on the site of the old Swindon Works of the Great Western Railway and in its heyday could produce three locomotives a week!

What a great task - outside in the fresh air, right in the heart of Swindon’s heritage, chatting with friends while weeding. Last time we took a scattergun approach to the weedy landscape so this time we were more strategic to achieve maximum aesthetic pleasure for the visitors and residents who all use this area. We filled lots of bags as the hard working staff really needed some help in this weed multiplying weather. The ‘after’ picture was very satisfying! We weren’t doing so well on our weekly quest to find peculiar objects. But wait - enter Bodyless Bob! A tiny dismembered head (of the toy variety). He’s not pretty, we don’t know his story, and one doesn’t like to ask but we adopted him and took him back with us anyway.

Before we left we had a quick look around the very impressive museum. Swindon really did make the most beautiful trains! On the way out we spotted a wooden train planter at the main entrance that was made by Swindon Men’s Shed who we visited last week. Oh, we do love a coincidental community connection!

On the run back we encountered a rather merry chap who joined our run for a bit. Move over Bodyless Bob, we give you ummmmm, Legless Larry? He seemed to enjoy jogging and shouting motivational things like “Go GoGo-Gym” which is an entirely different type of exercise altogether, but still, a future new member perhaps?!

Before the Task Force could consult the GoodGym training manual for recommendations on what to do in such situations, he waved goodbye and was off!

On to “Murder Alley” and there was some tomfoolery by the Walkie Talkies (check out the photo!). We apologise unreservedly to any security services who spotted us on CCTV and may have been inadvertently placed on red alert due to our theatrics. And it has not escaped our attention that all four of our newbies were perpetrators! Like we said, fitting in nicely.

All safely back at base, with Sam still looking resplendent in her wedding veil, we had a large, lovely and chatty catch up over coffee and cake.

Next up is a Group Run on Tuesday 27th August. We will be running approximately 9km in total to the Saltway Centre and back to help clear out some planters so that Aiming High families using the centre can plant their own bulbs and seeds. The Aiming High Short Breaks programme provides access for children and young people with disabilities to social and leisure activities, and to enable their parents and carers to have a break from their caring responsibilities. Pop it in your diary now and sign up here! If you’d like to join us for a post-run drink back at the Oasis, order at Coffee Corner before 6pm.