Dewey's #Readathon Wrap-Up

After participating in Dewey's Read-a-thon for the third time, I just wanted to wrap-up and share some quick thoughts while everything was fresh on my mind.
First, this has to be my favorite bookish event.  I really love setting aside a day and telling everyone to leave me alone while I do what I do best, read.  On top of that, other book lovers are doing the same thing at the same time so it's a social event as well.  I just love it and I can't wait for the next one.  
This was my first time actually sticking it through till the very end and let me say, that was so hard.  I almost felt abused.  Lol.  Part of my problem is that I didn't get but three or four hours of sleep the night before so I really struggled.  This time I was able to convince both my mom and my grandmother to participate and we had a blast.  Grandma made it to hour 18 and Mom made it to hour 22.
I finished four books:  Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen, Veil of Night by Linda Howard, The Sweetheart Hoax by Christy Hayes, and The Bungalow by Sarah Jio.  I started but did not finish Soulless by Gail Carriger.
Favorite mini-challenge: I don't remember what it was called but it was the food fight one.  It was late and when Ashley said she would throw spaghetti at me, I had to come up with something good. It was extra funny when mom and I were trying to come up with something and our brains were so fried.  That one really woke me up and brought lots of laughter.
A few lessons learned this time around:

• I need to stop fighting my love for socializing.  Once I stop feeling guilty about blog hopping and tweeting (a lot), I had more fun.
• SLEEP THE NIGHT BEFORE!  Next time I'm self-medicating.
• There needs to be a CAPTCHA intervention.  Really.  Mom was a cheerleader and I felt bad for her.  She was getting so frustrated.  I finally just told her to stop.  One of the problems with Captcha is it often doesn't show up until after you try to post the comment.  Uhhh she signed up for 3 hours of cheerleading and those were the most frustrating hours for me as well.
• It's important to do quick updates every hour I think because toward the end, it is hard to tell who is awake.
• Plan for recovery!!  I had to wake up and get on the road to get back to school and didn't really think much about the after part.  
• Physical books for the later hours...my eyes were so tired.

Honestly, there are different things about each readathon that are better than others..  But one of the consistent things is the fun you have and friendships you make while participating.  Especially during the later hours.  You have this "we are all in this together" mentality.  I also discover new bloggers.  It is really my favorite part.