I am not on top of my game this week and it is only 7:29am. I couldn’t sleep last night – tossed and turned for HOURS. Too hot. Too cold. Too uncomfortable on my left side. Too uncomfortable on my right side. Cat wrapped itself around my feet and now I can’t move anyway. Husband’s elbow is embedded in my kidney. A neighbor is gunning his engine at 3am for no apparent reason? Other cat has decided to fill in the space between husband and my faces. Lays his cute little nose against my cheek. Starts purring like he’s entering Nascar. And then hello four o’clock in the morning. I-hate-you-alarm-clock-at-six.

Forutnately I’m having a great hair day, so at least something is going right, but I’ve already got the Not Enough Sleep headache and I’ve come to work with some surprise emails waiting for me. Surprise!

And to top it off? I completely forgot to write U last night. I wrote V, W, and part of X, but no U. Today I am Unpredictable! Apparently.

So I thought U would be a good day to do a State of the Union address. No, it’s not as much fun as most of my posts, but I’ve got some good links below! You like links, right?

Thing One: If you do not read any other blog posts this week on my blog, you must return for Wednesday the 27th. That’s “W” for all those playing along at home. I am having a very big announcement that day.

Thing Two: The VERY BIG ANNOUNCEMENT ON WEDNESDAY pertains to something I’ve been dying to tell you all all month long.

Thing Three: In the middle of May there are going to be some visual changes to the blog. Content-wise it’ll stay pretty much the same, but visually it’s going to look a little different. I just want to give you a heads up. If anything I’ll have EXTRA content, not less.

Thing Four: A to Z Blog Challenge is just about over, and starting May 2nd we’re back to our regularly scheduled programming of Mon-Fri. I have a bunch of College of Blogging Series posts starting right way at the beginning of May, one of which is all about what I learned from other people’s blogs during the A to Z Challenge. I have probably visited 150 blogs this month, and there is a lot to learn by checking out other blogs. I also learned that the world is awful small sometimes.

Thing Five: Thank you to those of you who commented on my T is for Tell Your Story post. Because of Thing One and Thing Two, I’ve been slow responding to everyone, but you’ll hear from me in the next day or two.

Thing Six: Here are some great links to share that I haven’t had a good chance to share this month. Consider these Things Worth Knowing.

• News broke that “Three Cups of Tea” author Greg Mortenson may have fabricated portions of his NON-FICTION book. It took a surprisingly long time to discover this, but I guess his non-profit organization that came about because of and in part of his book has been acting pretty shady and it caused some eyebrow raises that lead journalists to uncover the truth about his Three Cups of Tea journey. The big reveal, for me, was the whole not actually kidnapped by Taliban thing. There are far reaching problems with this story, least of which is his fabrication. He’s once again made non-fiction writers look suspicious. He’s also caused teachers some big problems. One of the teacher’s at my husband’s school teaches this book and she was very passionate about it. Finding out that she’s been teaching a fabrication has called her passion into question and put her students on some shakey ground as far as trust in books goes. Her class was reading this book when the news broke. What do you guys think of all this?
• Scott Westerfeld has been posting some great stuff this month for the release of Goliath which is still a ways out (September). I’m so excited for this book. It is this year’s Mockingjay for me.
• Tahereh Mafi (whose name I am convinced one of these days I’m going to misspell. I live in TERROR of this event) posted a very cool post about first lines last week. She posts tons of great stuff, so I don’t know why this one popped out at me, but it did. Now it’s yours to marvel at. Have a ball!
• Bookshelves of Doom posted about a Stephen King easter egg that I’m not sure if it is a work of art or really creepy. I always wonder what goes through an artist’s head when they decide to start making weird art from weird objects. Not tha I begrudge them their weird art, I’m just wondering.
• And the weird casting for Hunger Games keeps rolling out. I love the actress they got for Katniss, she’ll be great I think. I can also get behind the actor who was cast for Peeta (yes, I know he looks wrong. That’s what hair and makeup crew are for. The kid can act. That’s what’s important.) I abhor the actor they got for Gale who looks like he’s at least 15 years older than the rest of the cast, whether that’s true or not, he looks it and I find the idea of him and Katniss giving each other eyes and I get a little sick in my mouth. And now John C. Reilly is being tapped for Haymitch.  He hasn’t accepted yet. I LOVE John C. Reilly, he’s an amazing actor, but he strikes me as too….jolly of a drunk for Haymitch. It could work, I guess. He’s certainly a top notch actor. I just pictured someone who looked a little less, I don’t know,  like a leprachaun.