In 2018, I lost my Grandad to Alzhiemers.

The hardest thing about conditions such as Alzhiemers and Dementia is that you effective lose the person twice; it's just you actually get to have a funeral the second time.

The title of our campaign comes from him; it was 2017, and I hadn't seen him in some time, my family called to tell me what was going on, and the next day I made a beeline to see him.

A lot had changed, he wasn't entirely switched on, but he was still there, and I, had to explain to him all the things that had happend to me since we'd last spoken, including the breakdown of my first marriage. To put it simply, i was pretty scared, I was expecting a full lecture on the sanctity of marriage or something, and for it to not go down well at all.

instead, all he did was sit there, look at me and say "well, you've got to be happy".

That was the last coherant thing he said to me, and it's stuck with me, to the point where it's now tattooed on my arm.

Fastforward to now, it's september 2021, im sitting on the sofa with my son, his namesake Edward, and I see an advert by the Alzhiemers society, with their new campaign for the month.

"Raise money by playing games for 24 hours". 

I'm well up for that; so this year, for my birthday, I'm planning on getting anyone who wants to, to come to mine, and help me achieve this - we'll play xbox, tabletop games, card games, hide and seek if we have to! the point is, every minute of every hour, for 24 hours, there will be a game being played in the house. There will be livestreams, stories, and even a special edition of @callyourhitz live from the scene.

I've a few weeks to prepare for this, and if I can get a good team onboard, then great, but if I can even get people to do "satelite events" at other locations, then even better.

 The whole point is about raising money for the Alzhiemers society, so that hopefully, one day, the only thing we ever forget is these terrible illnesses. and if we can maybe have a few laughs and some fun while doing it, then so much the better. after all

"You've got to be happy"