Hello and thanks for showing an interest in this cause. I'm Mark Bird, but those online who I play video games with know me as "Mr Stabby" (my handle), or "Stabby", or "that moron who fed the enemy Ursa a hundred times as KotL", or "the idiot who can't even carry wards", etc etc. The basic thing to grasp from this is that I'm not a really a good DOTA player.

In 2006, my father passed away as a result of a two year battle against lung and brain cancer. It was a slow, torturing and agonizing time for my whole family while we watched our loving father and devoted husband gradually get worse and worse. I will always remain grateful for all the work that the staff of St Elizabeth Hospice did for making his last days more comfortable.

It is for that reason that my family still regularly raises money for them, we have sold plants from our garden, recycled textiles into goods to be sold in craft fairs, and have taken part in charity events such as the 25 mile walk - with ALL the proceeds going to the charity. By the way, the cost of running the hospice comes to £9.1 million every year. That translates to roughly £25k PER DAY!  That's for their equipment, their electricity, their heating, their stocks of medicine, their coffee and a heck of a lot more.

This year marks the 25th year that the Hospice have been providing their ultimately valuable service to the good people of this county and I want to try something a bit different to remember it by - something that I had been wanting to do for a very long time. I will be playing DOTA2 for 24 hours, streaming live on my twitch.tv page. I've even got a webcam so you can see my beautiful face and hair. If I reach my goal of £500 then I will ask someone to shave my head LIVE! I'll even do it while in the middle of a game and join the prestigious echelons of bald gamers worldwide such as PyrionFlax and Shaneomad. (no really, I will)

Additionally, for every £100 after my goal, I will play the hero the chat wants me to play and how I should play it - no matter how bad I will be at it. Carry KotL, Support Riki or God help me, even Meepo. I will not even question it, I'll just do it.

Again, thank you for visiting this page and showing an interest to this cause. Any cash that you can spare, no matter how little will be gratefully received.