Mon 31st Oct 2016 at 6:45pm
Here at BadGym there are three ways to be evil:
1) Group runs. We all meet up once an week and go and make the borough a little bit more dreadful to live in. We find newly-decorated community centres and graffiti the walls; we visit public gardens, pour bleach over the flowers and scatter dandelion seeds everywhere, and we occasionally "give people a bit of a kick-in"
2) Missions. A small group of runners go to a vulnerable person's house, find a job that they struggle to do themselves and make it even harder. Classic example include putting lots of heavy furniture in front of doorways and removing the handles from saucepans.
3) Coach runs. This is where a runner is paired up with an isolated older person that they visit once a week and terrorise. The basic idea is to get as drunk as possible, get a cab to their house, do a runner without paying your fare and then sit and abuse the older person for a good half hour or so.
Four new evil-doers joined us tonight: 'orrible Oscar, Scary Scott, Spirit Sophie and Haunted Hazel. We hope you hated it and never come back.
So, this evening we paid a visit to Barnsbury Community Centre. Our job for the evening was to pull up flowers and plant weeds. We also had to smear lots of dirt around the new floor tiles in reception. We worked hard at generally messing the place up for a good 20 minutes and it look awful when we left. Brilliant!
And there was lots of getting fat tonight. Atrocious Alex provided gummy sweets and chocolate beans, Dastorous Dan provided homemade ghoulish biscuits and Spooky Simon provided the usual biscuits.
Ghoulish Game of the evening was finding three hidden chocolate pumpkins concealed underneath cones. Can't remember who found them now and I don't care cos I'm evil. BTW They were poisonous! Ha ha ha ha ha!
And also lots of dressing up this evening. See main photo for the efforts. Some clever ideas with Frightening Frances dressing up as "plantar fasciitis" and Ghastly Graham as a Trump supporter, but by democratic vote Bella and Hazel were clear winners and fought over their prize: a little millkybar ghost. I hope it rots your teeth.
Our disgusting debate? The best way to murder somebody and get away with it. Notable ideas: Richard suggested reversing over somebody in your driveway and Chilling Charlie like the idea of Ricin. There were other good ones that I forgot. If that makes you feel left out then GOOD!
I hate you all. Please don't come back next week,
Spooky Si
P.S. there's a picture of a mushroom with another mushroom on it in the photos. This is because I accidentally copied it across with the other photos then thought you might want to see it anyway
Tue 1st Nov 2016 at 12:48pm
Great report Simon!
Tue 1st Nov 2016 at 5:34pm
Such good photos and great report
Wed 2nd Nov 2016 at 8:26am
This is terrible. We'll done
Thu 3rd Nov 2016 at 10:20am
Awful report, photos are even worse! Not mushroom for any other comments...
Saturday 29th October 2016
Oscar has done their first good deed with GoodGym.
Oscar is a now a fully fledged GoodGym runner. They've just run to do good for the first time. They are out there making amazing things happen and getting fit at the same time.
Saturday 29th October 2016
Oscar completed their first weekend mission.
Oscar has forgone the usual weekend routine. Instead of lie-ins, roasts and strolls around the park Oscar has dropped everything to run a GoodGym mission for someone who needed help. Respect
Saturday 29th October 2016
Oscar run their first missions with GoodGym.
Oscar has just done something they've never done before. Oscar has just run a mission; they've changed their running route and run to help someone who really needed their help.
Sat 29th Oct 2016 at 11:00am
For Oscar's first GoodGym mission The Fantastic Four transformed Mr and Mrs O's front and back gardens and made their windows sparkle.
Two of us had come straight from Finsbury ParkRun's seventh-anniversary run (Anne ran and I marshalled with spooky tunes) and it was a milestone for ParkRun as they were celebrating their millionth runner this year. Great work! It was also wonderful to see that GoodGym featured on BBC Breakfast and to hear about hundreds of new sign ups.
If you need some help. In the neighbourhood. Who you gonna call? GOODGYM!
We met Andy and Oscar on the outer edges of Camden and were all ready to do good. Mrs O had previously called on GoodGym (though actually remembered it as JimJam!!) and had plenty of tasks ready for today. We were asked to split into two teams:
Anne and Andy didn't beat around the bush and took on the front garden: The front-of-house team trimmed back bushes, cleared away boxes and plucked purple flowers to make the garden good as new.
Oscar and I clipped high and low in the rear garden: Oscar had a 90-second masterclass about pruning and the importance of diagonal cuts before climbing the ladder and trimming back the high branches of the fruit trees. I started the tunes and then focused on clearing weeds and fallen fruit at low levels. While working we talked about different motivations to volunteer and stories about acting, writing and elderly isolation.
GoodGym United 4 - Weeds in the back garden 0
Once Anne and Andy finished their tasks, they joined forces and The Fantastic Four was reformed!
With double the numbers we had double the power and it did not take long to finish the topiary, weeding, raking and sweeping. As a bonus task, Oscar donned a pair of marigolds and cleaned the windows so that Mr and Mrs O could see their lovely garden from inside.
By the end of the mission we had filled four huge bags of green waste and cleared the path around the back garden so that Mr O could find some fresh air with a gentle walk.
SOUPerheroes
And finally Mrs O was very insistent that we should finish with a warming cup of carrot and coriander soup: no trick! Instead we were treated to anecdotes about Mrs O's many and varied travels around the world and we all encouraged her to finish writing her book: I'm sure it will be a fascinating and entertaining read.
Patrick signing out to think of a spooktacular costume for tonight!
Sat 29th Oct 2016 at 7:14pm
How come you all have blue shoes>
Sun 30th Oct 2016 at 10:30am
Haha! They're shoe coverings so we don't mess up the home. It's part of the ritual at this host. I even reminded her about them on arrival!
Sun 30th Oct 2016 at 6:59pm
Great report, thanks Patrick!