Homefront Anti-Misery Raiders [DBX]

[mtvcdm]

Seems this is the place for a Desert Bus-related thing.

Okay. So Wednesday night I get around to asking the DB Twitter account about volunteer surveys going out. The response back was that, unfortunately, there likely won't be an open call for on-site volunteers this year. This got expanded on in the Twitch chat by James and Paul this morning prior to 18 Games and Counting: first, so many of the existing volunteers came back for another tour of duty that there just isn't room; and second, with two different documentary crews that will be running around, they'd like to have everyone on staff already knowing the ropes.

Which makes total sense. [If this is how you're learning about this, apologies.]

Now, after learning this, I noted that I'd just do the same thing I did last year: take the money that I would have spent on a plane ticket out and back to Victoria and plow it into the toteboard instead; after all, I'd already committed to spending that money in the name of Child's Play anyway.

I would have left it at that, just me doing my own thing... except that almost immediately, three other members of the chat- a chat that wouldn't even have a stream to watch for another hour and a half yet and so wasn't all that big- made mention of them at least looking into doing likewise themselves. I hadn't even suggested anyone else do that. Kinda blew me away a bit.

And it also got me thinking that, hey, you know what, maybe it could be a Thing. So I'm going to go ahead and put it out there as a concept and let's just see what happens.

To that end, I am declaring myself the founder and commander of the Homefront Anti-Misery [H.A.M.] Raiders, a group of would-be out-of-town volunteers who will, for whatever reason, wind up watching Desert Bus from home. To claim membership in the H.A.M. Raiders, you go figure out whatever it would have cost you to travel to Victoria at that time of year, be it plane, ferry, gas for the car, and then simply donate the money instead at some point during Desert Bus. (Further travel costs, such as rental car, hotel, food, etc. get you a big thumbs-up if also represented, but the out-and-back is the backbone.)

If you happen to be a would-be volunteer from the Victoria area who would have no travel costs to represent but wishes to join the H.A.M. Raiders anyway, we can always make some travel costs for you. A decent substitute might be calculating the out-and-back to one of the Desert Bus cities, Tucson or Las Vegas; or the ferry to Child's Play's home of Seattle. (You also need not be an actual would-be volunteer if this seems like something you'd do, but remember, it's likely going to be somewhere in the three digits, maybe even four if you're from outside North America, and that may very well be beyond your budget.)

Important note: you are under no obligation to actually do this, and do not feel bad or anything if you for whatever reason can't. You might have otherwise earmarked it for bills and such. That's totally okay. Donate responsibly. This is just a thing that I was going to do and then a couple other people spontaneously thought they might also do and now I'm curious as to how big a faction this ends up being (and how much money can be raised for Child's Play by creating it).