***Dave mentions on his blog that this year’s Blogathon is scheduled to take place on July 29th and he says he’s kicking around the possibility of participating this year. I’ve only participated once back in 2003 (you can read all of the entries in this special category) and I had intended to participate in 2004, but they decided to take that year off. I missed 2005’s Blogathon because I didn’t find out about it until the last minute, but this year I’ve got enough of a warning to make it a possibility.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with a Blogathon I should mention that it’s just like a Walkathon or a Bowlathon, only without all the exercise. Here’s how it works: Participating bloggers sign up with the Blogathon folks and pick a charity they plan to blog for. Then they start harassing their readers to make pledges for their (the blogger’s) participation in the Blogathon. When July 29th rolls around all the participating bloggers start blogging at their local equivalent of 6AM Pacific Time (that would be 9:00 AM here in the Detroit area) and they have to try to update once every 30 minutes for the following 24 hours. Pledges can either be on a per-entry basis or a flat amount for the whole shebang depending on the preferences of the person making the pledge. Money pledged goes straight to the charities themselves and not through the blogger or the Blogathon people so you don’t have to worry about anyone taking a couple of bucks off the top.

In 2003 SEB raised a whopping $193.25 for our chosen charity—The Association for International Cancer Research—which was about $100 more than I expected. Sure that’s not a lot of dough, but when added to everyone else who participated it made for over $83,000 raised for various charities that year. The folks at the AICR seemed pretty happy with our efforts despite the paltry amount and I didn’t have anywhere near the readership numbers I have these days. So I’m thinking about trying it again this year, but for a different charity.

The question is: Are you guys interested in pledging? This is an honest question because I know a lot of you went out of your way in the past year to donate money to me and my family during the 10 months I was unemployed and you may be sick to death of me standing around with my hand out like the kid from Oliver Twist. (Please sir, can I have some more?) The difference being, of course, that this time you’ll be donating to an actual charity for the fun of watching me try to write coherent entries at 3AM. I could even borrow my sister-in-law’s webcam so you could literally watch me if you’re so inclined and think it would be amusing. Hell, maybe I’ll put on my collar mic and you can actually distract me while I’m trying to write and get to hear my voice, something a lot of you have been obsessing about for reasons I don’t fully understand.

So let me know if you think this would be a fun thing to do and you’re willing to toss a few bucks towards a worthy cause. We need a minimum pledge amount of at least $20 to participate and I think we can manage that quite well. While you’re at it send along any suggestions you have for the charity you think SEB should be blogging for. It can be any charity that will accept donations online and the Blogathon folks have a few suggestions we can consider. Off top of my head my first thought is of the ACLU, but I know not everyone who reads SEB is a fan of the ACLU so I’m open to suggestions. I’d just like it to be a secular organization relevant to the issues we talk about on SEB.