Here is a look at some of the stories that CNN plans to follow this week:
Illinois primary
One of the larger delegate prizes is up for grabs in Tuesday's Illinois primary. The four Republican candidates will slug it out for the state's 54 delegates to the party's national convention in July.
Flagging frontrunner Mitt Romney on Sunday called himself the "economic heavyweight" in the field, while referring to closest competitor Rick Santorum and President Barack Obama as "lightweights."
For his part, Santorum took to CNN's "State of the Union with Candy Crowley" to slap at Romney's inability to put his competitors away despite vast financial resources: "When you have this amount of resources and this amount of advantage, (yet) you can't manage and deliver the mail and win this nomination, that shows a real weakness in his ability to be able to govern," Santorum said.
Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich has been concentrating on the March 24 Louisiana primary, including a tour of the Audubon Zoo in New Orleans on Friday. “With both Santorum and me, (Romney is) now confused as to who he is attacking. It's his only technique," Gingrich said. "I tell people he's like a 4-foot-8 guy who wants to play center and his only technique is to shrink the others, which I think bodes very badly for a general election."
The fourth man in the race, Rep. Ron Paul, is far behind in the delegate count and spent more money than he took in during February. Paul’s self-reported spending of $3.54 million outpaced his fundraising of $3.27 million, and he ended the month with $1.36 million in the bank. His campaign reported carrying no debt.
Queen to make rare speech
Great Britain's Queen Elizabeth II is scheduled to deliver a speech to both houses of Parliament on Tuesday. It is expected to be the only time she will publicly acknowledge her Diamond Jubilee, the 60th anniversary of the beginning of her reign. (Plenty of others are talking about it, though, including soccer megastar David Beckham.)
The 85-year-old monarch's appearance will follow by one day the first official speech by the Duchess of Cambridge, the former Kate Middleton. The bride of Elizabeth's grandson Prince William will speak at the formal opening of a children's hospice facility in Ipswich, England. The popular duchess will also plant a tree, tour the facility and meet patients, parents and staff members.
The two royals attended a fashion show together last week.
Hearing in Ohio school shooting
T.J. Lane, the 17-year-old student accused of shooting six of his peers last month at a high school in Ohio, was scheduled to appear in court Monday for a hearing on whether he should be tried as an adult, but that proceeding has been pushed back to April 3.
Three students were killed, two were seriously wounded and one was grazed in the shooting February 27 in the cafeteria of Chardon High School in Geauga County, 30 miles east of Cleveland.
Lane faces three counts of aggravated murder, two of attempted aggravated murder, and one count of felonious assault. The case is currently in juvenile court; the April 3 hearing will discuss a prosecution motion to move the case to adult court.
World Water Day
Raise a glass on Thursday to toast World Water Day, and be thankful that you can. The theme of this year's United Nations-sponsored event is water and food security. Its slogan is "The world is thirsty because we are hungry."
"Over the coming decades, feeding a growing global population and ensuring food and nutrition security for all will depend on increasing food production," Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said. "This, in turn, means ensuring the sustainable use of our most critical finite resource – water."
Funny business
The 30th World Clown Association Annual Clown Convention is being held all week in San Diego, California.
The event will feature theme parties, lectures, workshops, dealer merchandise displays, and competitions - including the hotly contested balloon-twisting contest on Friday.
Despite the presence of hundreds, if not thousands of attendees, parking is not expected to be a problem, given clowns' legendary penchant for car-pooling.
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Just got back from colorado, utah, and mt whitney 14,499ft nice and cold i love it just trying to stay in shape. Im continuing to alpine guide , so just out in my play ground
You can have the cold weather superman, we in michigan have been enjoying 80 plus today!
@@@@chrissy you folks out there might have a little of cold snap coming your way high winds here in cali! But i love it! By the way chrissy thank you for your support iys the best quick and simple my climbing partner said the same thing honesty is best they have been through enough since there mother has had custody but maybe its best for them. But THANK YOU SO MUCH!
Talknto you all soon. I lived in illinoise for two years and i loved the frigid winters id come back there to live if i could .the people where so nice its quiet and smogless. Out here to quit smoking you have to move out of the state because of the smog its horrible here its no wonder why people are moving out asap. Its no longer the golden state here to many mean people and its usually the ones that were born and stayed here but for me , ive lived so many other places it has not rubbed off , and espacially the last week or so im freed up .
Lmao @ superman, it aint been cold this year! And we have had hardly no snow. It was 8l tonite in northern mich which is unreal in march. I know, i lived here my whole life. We did have tornados this week tho another odd thing.
@troll of @bobcat, You have failed.
Here in Mizzery it's been very mild. Snow shovel still sits where I set it at the beginning of winter as it hasn't been needed not even once. I love it. Me a displaced Texan for almost twenty years now and still can't get myself climatized to the usually cold winters here. Yesterday I grilled steaks on the deck. Something I hadn't done in any month of March since I moved here. Less snow and ice, the better.
And mary thanks for your lead in, everyone knows your just philips mouthpiece! You aint got the brain power to get your own stats, so you had to wait til today to get them from philip! If you had a brain you would realize you just proved chrissys point!
As for insane, WHO is this (average american individual) that CONSUMES l59 gallons of water DAILY? ? ? Thats impossible!
@ mary, you can keep your *excuses* to yourself! Tired indeed! More like not prepared!
Are you ready for those *stats* mary? The US has provided $l00 mil in food to africa, china provided $l9.5 mil, and russia provided $5 mil. Guess we arent the *pigs* as you stated.
As for the 159 gallons, that has got to be a typo.
There is no way on this earth that Americans are personally using that much, whether drinking, flushing, bathing, washing clothes...or what. NO WAY.
@@@@ChRISSY Good morning everyone so whats the gangs plans for today? Im headind to a special beach today , CHRISSY can you guess what kind of beach it is? Nice and warm youd never know that we had two days of narley rain, oh well its all good the air is clean for one day. And it smells good out here for once
@@@@??? Youd better be nice to Mrs Mary ill have you flagged and if you start on me ill have you in a night mare you cannot awake from got it? So leave mary allllooooonnnneeee. Everybody has there good and bad points. Just like you blogging and getting your words off the web sites are you busted now? Ohhhh yeah! So take it easy.
@ superman, good afternoon! Lmao, would that be a beach with sand and water?
Good one mary youve still got some bite. You bit me one night it only takes one time to figure someone out and you got it! I dont take any more iether. Stay strong