Desert Bus for Hope 3
The 3rd Annual Desert Bus for Hope, entitled Desert Bus 3 - Desert Bus VI in Japan, was held at 6pm PST on November 20th 2009. Lasting 5 days and 16 hours the crew raised $137,210.68.Date: November 20, 2009 I
Desert Bus for Hope 2009 was officially announced on March 26th, when the first update was posted on Desertbus.org. The countdown to the event began on August 25th 2009 with a challenge from James that if the site reached $10 000 by the event's starting date, November 20th, 2009, he would drive the bus for the first 12 hours of the event. The goal was met, and James did the 12 hours, becoming the only DBfH to do a complete run from Tuscon to Las Vegas. After 5 days, 16 hours (136 hours), and large number of auctions, caramelldansen, surprise guest appearances, and other craziness, the final total was 140 449.68 USD. The crew presented a novelty-size cheque Child's Play Charity Dinner for that approximate amount (the last few donations had yet to be tallied when the cheque had to be printed).
Official videos for Desert Bus 3 are slowly being uploaded to Youtube via the desertbus09 channel
Crew, Volunteers and Friends
Crew
- Alex Steacy
- Bill Watt
- Graham Stark
- James Turner
- Jeremy Petter
- Kathleen De Vere
- Matt Wiggins
- Morgan vanHumbeck
- Paul Saunders
- Tally Heilke
- Tim Sevenhuysen
Volunteers and Friends
- Andy Cownden
- Andre Van Slyke
- Ash Vickers
- Ashley Turner
- Chris Whitman
- Kate Stark
- Johnny Blakeborough
- Kate Watt
- Robin Rose
Notable Moments
- Desert Bus for Hope Craft-a-Long
Conceived by forum member illuviel members of the Loading Ready Run forum handcrafted items to be auctioned during Desert Bus 3. Site-related items included the Lil' Warriors of Darkness (as seen in Pathfinder, Magicland) and a painting of Kate (in her gang outfit from Commodore Hustle).
- That's No Moon, It's OctoPimp
OctoPimp was a chat member who won several auctions during the 5 day event. These included a custom artwork by Ken Steacy (Alex Steacy's Dad), Yu-Gi-Oh Abridged T-shirts with pins and singed DVD and an ONI PRESS collection of Scott Pilgrim comic books.
- Matt pledging to go see a set amount of New Moon in one day if they broke $100,000. This was broken by a sniping by the OctoPimp.Matt's Regret
- News that two Desert Bus viewers asked for donations to Desert Bus at their wedding!
Auctions
- City of Heroes game signed by the development team - Price Guessing Auction. A number was chosen from 5 to 15 (inclusive) and who ever in the chat bid that number first would win. Two song requests were taken and at the end the bids were check and no one had hit the selected number of 6. The chat were saying what they had bid to eliminate the wrong numbers. One chat member both confirmed the number and denied it by saying he bid 6 when they hadn't. Another song request was taken and the number was hit until a dual bid of 6 and 8 by a chat member won out. Total bids unknown.
- 12 Yu-Gi-Oh Abridged T-shirts and pins - A signed DVD would be added by Kroze (member of Yu-Gi-Oh Abridged) if the bid reached $650, this happened when a bidding war between OctoPimp and Tscully broke out. The final total was $666 by OctoPimp
- ONI PRESS Collection of 5 Scott Pilgrim Comic Books. An infamous bidding war between OctopPimp and Overlordstowell, the bidding became so fierce that it stopped Graham and Kathleen from going home to get some sleep. The final total was $2,777.
Audio of this bidding war and part of the Yu-Gi-Oh Abridged bidding is available here: OctoPimp vs Overlordstowell
- Custom Art Work by Ken Steacy. Final Bid was $1500 by OctoPimp.
Appearances and Phone-ins
- Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw
- Jonathan Coulton
- Wil Wheaton
- Wes Borg
- Ken Steacy
- Russ Pitts - the Escapist
- Joel DeYoung - Hothead Games
- Kristen Lindsay - Child's Play
- Frank Cifaldi
- Robert Ashley - A Life Well Wasted
Sponsors
Desert Bus for Hope 2009 is the first Desert Bus event to have a host of official sponsors, who have donated prizes for auction during the event. Some of these sponsors include:
- The Escapist
- Oni Press
- Hothead Games
- Harmonix Games
Songs
Some of the songs sung during Desert Bus 3:
- A Whole New World from Aladdin - Sung by Graham Stark and Alex Steacy
- Still Alive by Jonathan Coulton - sung by Kristin Lindsay and others
- Gay Bar - sung by Matt Wiggins
- Particle Man by They Might Be Giants
- Snake Eater, the theme from MGS3
- Time Warp from The Rocky Horror Picture Show - sung/danced by Graham, Morgan vanHumbeck, Jeremy Petter and Tally Heilke
- Love Shack by the B-52s
- We Are The Champions by Queen
- Gaston (as Rosco) from Beauty and the Beast
- The Darkwing Duck Theme
- I'm A Little Teapot
- Do you Wanna Date My Avatar? - sung by Tally as goth catgirl
- LoadingReadyRap by 64K - Performed by 64K
- Piano Man by Billy Joel
- The Times They Are A'Changing by Bob Dylan
- Modern Major General - Sung by Dale Friesen
- Blame Canada From South Park: Bigger Longer and Uncut
- Never Gonna Give You Up by Rick Astley
- Barbie Girl by Aqua - Sung By Dale and Tally
- Modern Major General - sung by Dale
- We Will Rock You by Queen
- The Internet is for Porn from Avenue Q - performed by Graham and Kathleen De Vere
- The Final Countdown (as The Final Busdown) by Europe - sung by all
- The Macarena - performed by Kathleen, Tally and Graham
- The War of 1812 - Sung by Wes Borg
- Every OS Sucks - Sung by Wes Borg
- Save a Horse, Ride a Cowboy
- Javert's Suicide from Les Miserables - sung by Jer
- There's Something There from Beauty and the Beast - sung by Jer and Tally
- Birdhouse in Your Soul by They Might Be Giants - sung by Jer and Tally
- Re: Your Brains by Jonathan Coulton - sung by Jer
- Re: Your Brains by Jonathan Coulton - performed by Graham as Billy Mays
- Caramelldansen - performed by Kathleen and others
- Take Me To Your Leader and The Breakfast Song by the Newsboys - sung by Tally and Tim Sevenhuysen
- Like a Bus - performed by Graham and Woody Tondorf (rewritten by Woody)
- I'm on a Bus - performed by Woody, Morgan, Matt and Jer (rewritten by Woody)
- O Valencia! by the Decemberists - sung by Chris Whitman, Jer, Tally and others
- Song of Blue Wind from Spring Awakening - sung by Kara
- On My Own from Les Miserables - sung by Kara
- Fox in Socks by Dr. Seuss - performed by Jer, Paul Saunders and Graham in Solid Snake voices
- Don't stop me now by Queen - performed by Morgan and Bill Watt. (Ironically Bill crashed during this song. The only crash of DBFH3)
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