This past weekend was the Extra Life campaign, where we brought in nearly $2000 in donations between the four of us, and Chris is still taking them for his marathon in two weeks. We couldn’t be happier about our success, but man, I learned that I can’t do this anymore. I don’t have the ability to stay up so late and then sleep all day.
By 1:30 in the morning, I was nodding off at my console, even though I was playing Dragon Age Inquisition and I simply adore Dragon Age. I tried to talk myself into waking up. Maybe I should play something else. Maybe I should run around the house for a few minutes to get the blood flowing. And then I thought about the risk of getting sick from pushing myself, and I’m single parenting for the next two months. I turned to Jen and said, “I’m sorry to wuss out, but I’m done. I’m going to get up early in the morning and finish my last 6 hours.” She responded with, “Oh thank God, I’m with you.” We didn’t even speak as we shut down our game systems and slunk off to bed. I barely remember my head hitting the pillow.
As we got moving the next day and prepared for another six hours of sitting in front of our machines, we realized that we can’t keep doing this. We both love video games, and we both wish we had this ability to play them all day every now and then like the single kids do. But we’re tired, and we have these stupid adult responsibilities, and we can’t even right now.
That said, I had a great time. I showed how to finish Far Cry 4 in 20 minutes, I played Tales from the Borderlands and wanted more, I made plans to get Borderlands: The Handsome Jack Collection to play with Jen, and I started a brand-spanking new game of Dragon Age Inquisition, which got me excited about that RPG all over again. AND I raised over $600 for Children’s Medical Center of Dallas. I can’t ask for much more than that.
But I know when it’s time for me to not do something, and it’s time for me to drop doing Extra Life. Well, at least it’s time for me to not plan to do it all night. I’ll have to do the old people thing and break it up into 12-hour sessions. It’s something to think about, anyway.
For now, I’m ready for a nap. For three days.
Probably a better idea to split it up. If your only choice is to marathon for 24 hours, then Extra Life is going to lose a lot of streamers. Take a long weekend and do 8 hours a day from Friday-Sunday?