Well F*CK YOU Afterhours!

DeVore

I have a busy enough January without having a vast quantity of SSF cash to allocate!!!!

The total from SSF this year was 19,600 odd (I'm still counting change from some of the auction events like the photo book)... and there are a couple of minor cheques to arrive yet, so we will top 20K.

Thats insane.

So, this year I'm going to try to report back on how things go and show you where your cash goes. Now, that isnt as straightforward as you might think. SSF runs for about 4 months after xmas while logistics are worked out.

Rushing things often costs more than is you take things slowly (for example, I *could* just go out and buy iPads and Lego from the shops... or I could bother Currys for a discount like this: http://www.boards.ie/ttfthread/2056834674 or get www.brick.ie to help me source cheap Lego, like they have agreed to ...)

This years hit list is currently targetting:
BarretsTown
LauraLynn
BeeForBattens
Good Child Foundation
Donegal Youth Service
Head Strong
Pieta House


We're probably looking at about 2k a piece there so with one or two being in the 3-4k range (its rare we exceed 2k a project though). So that leaves us with a bit of cash left in the kitty.

Why arent I more accurate with the numbers?? Well that brings up another sensitive point. You dont always want that sort of thing public. It invites questions like "why did they get more then them" etc. However I also like oversight in these things because it feels right to do so. So what I've decide to do is to keep pretty tight tallies of cash spent with the Mods and with a representative of the forum itself. How do we pick such a rep? Easy, I think this year he picked himself by his own generosity so Beasty can oversee that the money is going to the right place, 100%.

All good? Cool... I have to say that some of the projects are the very best of SSF ever. Honestly I'm excited by them and when you see them (I'll be posting pics) I think you will agree every penny pulled its weight. I'll be back with more on the projects in detail soon...

There is one *very* special project but I'm sworn to secrecy...

Sarky

I thought you'd finally snapped by the title. Was going to be disappointed, but, well, charity.

Ava_e

\0/

Great choices, I'm delighted to see BarettsTown on the list, I did some work with them and they really are a fantastic, life enhancing organisation.

Rented Mule

So that leaves us with a bit of cash left in the kitty.

Cash for nude pictures and this is how you phrase it ?

Mint Sauce

I just seen the title, and I thought, ah another disgruntled member has rereged after a ban'



But, well done after hours, DeVore, and of course Whoopsee.

Abi

DeVore wrote: »

Why arent I more accurate with the numbers?? Well that brings up another sensitive point. You dont always want that sort of thing public....

...There is one *very* special project but I'm sworn to secrecy...

It was just resting in my account..






:pac:

smash

Well f*ck you too Tom. :P

CrazyRabbit

DeVore wrote: »

There is one *very* special project but I'm sworn to secrecy...

Liposuction/plastic surgery for the mods that went naked for SSF?

TeddyTedson

I have huge respect DeVore for your trollish thread titles...oh and the charity things too, I guess...

Death and Taxes

DeVore wrote: »

I have a busy enough January without having a vast quantity of SSF cash to allocate!!!!

The total from SSF this year was 19,600 odd (I'm still counting change from some of the auction events like the photo book)... and there are a couple of minor cheques to arrive yet, so we will top 20K.

Thats insane.

So, this year I'm going to try to report back on how things go and show you where your cash goes. Now, that isnt as straightforward as you might think. SSF runs for about 4 months after xmas while logistics are worked out.

Rushing things often costs more than is you take things slowly (for example, I *could* just go out and buy iPads and Lego from the shops... or I could bother Currys for a discount like this: http://www.boards.ie/ttfthread/2056834674 or get www.brick.ie to help me source cheap Lego, like they have agreed to ...)

This years hit list is currently targetting:
BarretsTown
LauraLynn
BeeForBattens
Good Child Foundation
Donegal Youth Service
Head Strong
Pieta House


We're probably looking at about 2k a piece there so with one or two being in the 3-4k range (its rare we exceed 2k a project though). So that leaves us with a bit of cash left in the kitty.

Why arent I more accurate with the numbers?? Well that brings up another sensitive point. You dont always want that sort of thing public. It invites questions like "why did they get more then them" etc. However I also like oversight in these things because it feels right to do so. So what I've decide to do is to keep pretty tight tallies of cash spent with the Mods and with a representative of the forum itself. How do we pick such a rep? Easy, I think this year he picked himself by his own generosity so Beasty can oversee that the money is going to the right place, 100%.

All good? Cool... I have to say that some of the projects are the very best of SSF ever. Honestly I'm excited by them and when you see them (I'll be posting pics) I think you will agree every penny pulled its weight. I'll be back with more on the projects in detail soon...

There is one *very* special project but I'm sworn to secrecy...

Some people would do anything to get Post of the Day:D

Seriously though, well done! Rather you than me having to pick which charites to allocate to!

derfderf

CrazyRabbit wrote: »

Liposuction/plastic surgery for the mods that went naked for SSF?

I heard it was for el weirdo's ransom.

4zn76tysfajdxp

DeVore wrote: »

There is one *very* special project but I'm sworn to secrecy...

I can't wait to see tomorrow morning's special announcement:

DeVore wrote: »

I wanna let you all know about a fantastic investment oppurtunity. Now, I already know what you're thinking, "this is another pyramid scheme" but in reality, it's more like a tetrahedron...

ITS_A_BADGER

Naked admins next year?

Sofaspud

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dK1DLeuriUs

Ken.

ITS_A_BADGER wrote: »

Naked admins next year?

After this years success I think the only way to top it is to skip the Admins(nothing against them,I'm sure they all have lovely bodies) and go straight to

2013 SSF Challenge "Naked Office Staff".

LizT

Well done to everyone involved, great causes

DeVore

Locked and Loaded.... awaiting orders saaaahh!

https://twitter.com/DeVore/status/294129082633957376

This is the first 5k spent and will be delivered late this week and early next week. The thai tims are going to sort themselves out with some audio kit so I'm sure we'll hear them using it soon

DeVore

Woodwork materials bought and delivered to a carpenter (from Boards!) who is building BarretsTown a wooden maze for their Garden.

Plus 13 Samsung MP3 players and 13 portable speakers to BarretsTown so each of their accommodation houses can have a kids cabaret (currently they share the one MP3 player!).

*BOOM*, Headshot!

DeVore

XBOX, Ps3, Laptop gone to the Donegal Youth Foundation for mental health.

*BOOM* ... Tango Down!

DeVore

5 Ipads fired at LauraLynn...


*BOOM*... terrorists win.

Micky Dolenz

Really does bring a smile to my face.

Nice one DeV and Well done all.

DeVore

I'm just the conduit... (Got a biiiig hug from the nice Barretstown lady though... *mmf*!)

The best bits are still to come, couple of real cracker projects in the works but it will be spring before they are complete I think...

Lollipops23

Aw, this is making me well right up! Feckin hormones....

Monty - the one and only

Now thats one way to get people to look at a thread Dev

Drakares

There's just so much win here that I'm getting the warm fuzzies...

My name is URL

Fantastic stuff! Fair play to you & and the people you've roped into helping out, and of course to everyone that donated to make it possible.

FoxT

bump....

Any update on what donations went where?

Thanks,
-FoxT

DeVore

Yep, have some pics from Barretstown, just this month... will post shortly.

Additionally, there is a sort of "oversight committee" now, which includes the AH mods and Beasty (cos he donated a metric ****-ton of cash, I figured he has skin in this game). They get regular emails to let them know the details of the budget expenditure.

Also I just got totally trolled by my own subject line... I was all like *wtf* ...

DeVore

So, we budgeted about 4k for Barretstown this year which simply wouldnt have been possible in previous years. I worked with a lovely lady called Bernie Angew to maximise the impact that our 4k could have and even if I say so myself, I think we did freakin' awesome.

Firstly there was the music room, we fitted out their music room with a whole PILE of new instruments as music-therapy is a big part of their camp ethos. This has completely renovated the room and all the instruments in it.

Secondly we built (with the help of the Boards carpentry forum!) a bunch of over sized wooden toys and games for the forest (I hope to have pics of them soon). Things like a metre-square maze suspended from polls which the kids have to tilt (as a team) to roll a ball around and avoid the holes in it! Or triangles and parabolas of wood which fit into a metre square frame ... but only if you do it right. That sort of thing.

Thirdly we planned and built a kind of "chill out" zone for kids for whom the whole "camp" is a bit much sometimes. I can tell you from being down there this month that its kinda mental ... some kids need time and space to just play on their own, particularly the younger ones. So we built a circus-comme-fantasy-princess room. This room didnt exist and wouldnt exist without SSF.

So, we worked with a bunch of TOTALLY COOL AMAZING people from a site called "brick.ie" who are massive Lego heads. They dealt with Lego Ltd who were great and they got us a super deal on 1,500 euros worth of generic lego.This went in the chill out room so the kids can play with it while pretending to be princesses or clowns etc
The link has pics of this room and the (drawers!) of lego. 1500 buys you a hellova lot of lego it transpires !

Plus the brick.ie peeps worked with some planners in the UK and designed a terrific lego version of the Barretstown logo. From the plans we then had a day where each house of the camp spent time making the 10cmx10cm parts from tiny 1x1 lego blocks to match the master plan and at the end we have a 1 metre x 1 metre lego logo built by the kids! You can see a pic of it in the link! Its crazy how much work went into that but the kids LOVED doing it.

So, the pics are here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/devoresphotos/sets/72157634868662305/
and thats where I will put all the future pics I plan on getting from all the projects so that by the end of the year we can have a gallery of what was achieved.

The funny thing is that while Barretstown is my favourite all time charity, the best project for SSF this year is (imho) not with them and I am still waiting for us to do our bit in that (its a MAJOR project and we are only a small part in it so ... things get delayed unfortunately). I'm sworn to secrecy but as soon as I can, I'll tell you all about it.

DeVore

A word of explanation too. SSF usually takes about 4-6 months to distribute the cash because Xmas is a REALLY BAD TIME [tm] to try to get anything done, plus I dont just dump the money into slush funds for charities, we do it on a project basis typically. This year we had a truly ridiculous amount of cash donated and it is taking time to bring all the projects to fruition. We have about 7k left with a solid 5k of that earmarked for projects in progress. I keep a bit back for unexpected costs or over runs.

This is kinda why I didnt make all this transparent before, because people emotionally want to hear that the money is spent at xmas, and while a decent chunk of it IS, in reality the boring logistics take time. This year more than most because of the size of money raised.

But I dont want you to think that this means there is a cost of SSF. In fact quite the opposite. No one in SSF is paid. Nada. 100% of the funds are used in the projects. When the funds ARENT being spent they sit in a special, dedicated bank account and the interest from that bank account is added to the pile.

Just wanted to be clear on that because there is a lot of trust in me and I appreciate that, hence the transparency this year.

well F*CK YOU DeVore you made me cry

TeddyTedson

DeVore wrote: »

Also I just got totally trolled by my own subject line... I was all like *wtf* ...

It's not nice when it happens to you is it

Anyway, sounds like last year is going to be hard to beat.

Micky Dolenz

Deleted User wrote: »

well F*CK YOU DeVore you made me cry

Cos he wouldn't give you the iPad you were asking for?

Micky Dolenz

Micky Dolenz wrote: »

Cos he wouldn't give you the iPad you were asking for?

I already have an iPad, I wanted lego :cool:

MugMugs

Micky Dolenz wrote: »

Cos he wouldn't give you the iPad you were asking for?

No because he was the photographer and wouldn't give her top back afterwards.

DeVore

If you really want to be moved emotionally.... you should see the stuff the kids have already started to make with the lego.... the staff put the best ones up on the shelves (you can see a few in background of the pictures....). It really does bring it home to you that a few quid can make an enormous difference (not to mention, when its backed up by a big organisation like Barretstown! They have something to do with it too )

Ken.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2057033747
For anyone wanting an update.