Sunday 4 November 2018

Extra Life game day 2018


One week ago our team #Dominicstrong total on the Extra Life website showed that we'd raised $13,600 out of the goal we'd set of $15,000.

That wasn't entirely accurate. Our Superhero Night game day with the Medicine Hat Mavericks raised $1,500 which was simply sent as a cheque to the Alberta Children's Hospital (and not counted in our Extra Life numbers). About $2,000 was donated in U.S. currency, so worth an extra $600 when you convert it. They now accept Canadian currency, so long as you use their credit card option.

We knew game day would generate more money, but for the first time since 2014 we weren't doing a public 25-hour event. We decided after last year that it was just too much work for too few results. I wondered whether we could raise the same amount from home.

The answer was a resounding yes.

We shared the heck out of our individual pages. We told family and friends. We teased doing a Baby Shark video, bought onesies to celebrate reaching our $15,000 goal, then set to work getting individual team members to goals earning them Extra Life shirts (at $200), then medals (silver at $500, gold at $1,000). All while playing a variety of video and board games all over Medicine Hat.

Game day, which began at 8 a.m. Nov. 3 and finished at 8 a.m. on Nov. 4, was a resounding success. Here are some of the highlights:

- Sarah, Dave and Zach drove all the way from Manitoba to play with our team.
- James agreed to wear a mermaid onesie if we got him to $500 (we totally did).
- From Calgary, Tamara decided she would chop off seven inches of hair if she could help raise an extra $500 (success!).
- Elsewhere in Medicine Hat, a group of our friends held their own game day and raised nearly $700. We met up with them for some Pokemon Go mid-day.
- Other friends in Cold Lake, Lethbridge and Calgary did their own game days and took in donations for our team.

As for the games, we played a ton. From Mario on the old SNES to VR at SixoneSix Entertainment downtown, board games and even ping pong. Party games like Jackbox and console games like Rocket League.

We held our now-annual bonus hour tournament (taking place before the daylight savings time change set the time back for a second 2 a.m.), Bob winning the title belt.

We finished strong, though exhausted.

In the past week, our team raised more than $5,000. Our total now sits at $19,040. When you factor in the Mavericks game day and the currency exchange, it's more like $21,640.

Thank you everyone who contributed. I like to think Dominic's giving us all a big thumbs up for a job well done.

No comments:

Post a Comment