Update: It's my birthday on September 15! A quick and easy present would be a couple dollar donation to this campaign to help people get clean water wells and sanitary latrines.

All I want for my birthday is for people to stop dying of waterborne illness. Is that too much to ask?

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Original Campaign: Dirty Water Dogs for Clean Water Wells

On June 11, I ate 21.5 hotdogs and buns (HDBs) in a Nathan's Hot Dog Eating Contest Qualifier in Tempe, AZ. On July 4, I will be competing at the finals in Coney Island, and hoping to make my friends and family proud in the absurdest way I know how -- by eating a ridiculous amount of hot dogs.

Even if they have never seen one of these contests, Americans tend to know two things about the Nathan's challenge:

(1) The infamous Kobayashi's ability to eat over 50 HDBs (less people know about Joey Chestnut's record of 68).
(2) The technique of dunking the buns in water to make them go down easier.

If you take water out of the equation, these superhuman levels of consumption would not be possible. Who knows how many Chestnut would be able to eat without dunking the buns or washing down his bites. I, for one, probably would have choked to death on my first bite of hot dog. (True story for another time).

But for a billion people in the world, water IS out of the equation. Every week, millions of women and their children walk more than 14 miles just to get water for their families. Most of this water is contaminated, and causes life threatening diseases, but it's all they have.

With the global water crisis going on, I want to be up there at the Nathan's table knowing that every hot dog is important. I want every bite to matter. That's why I'm asking for pledges per HDB you think I can eat, or every HDB I ate at the Tempe Qualifier, or flat out donations to help achieve my goal.

Let's impact the world. On July 4, I'm going to eat a crap-ton of hotdogs. Let's put that stupid skill to good use.

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UPDATE: July 4 has come and gone, and after pushing myself to my limit, I came up a bit short of my goal and ate a total of 20 HDBs -- after battling a rough case of the hiccups during the last 3 minutes of the competition.

We reached the original goal of $1000 due to the amazing support of friends, family, and a few kind strangers, so let's up the ante! The new goal is $1500 -- that's enough money to bring clean water to 75 people (for life!). That's also the equivalent of raising $75 per hot dog/bun I ate during the Nathan's Hot Dog Finals.

If you are proud of my absurd skill, or just want to help those who live without a basic necessity that comes so easy for us, please consider donating whatever you can! And thanks again for all your support!

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Because of charity: water's unique model, 100% of all donations go directly to water projects, and each donation is "proved" when projects are complete. I aim to raise $1,000 by July 5. I hope you'll join me in helping them now.