If you were to ask 10 people to think of an adjective that best describes me, “kind” would not be a word that ended up on anyone’s list. Other 4-letter words, sure, but “kind”? Not so much.

Don’t get me wrong – I have my moments. For instance, when I see someone in and around my neighborhood who looks like they are clearly lost or confused, I will often step in to ask them where they are trying to go and point them in the right direction. It still bothers me that I sent someone the wrong way by mistake 3 summers ago. Totally accidental, Mr. Belgian Tourist, I promise!

No, I am not your classic “nice guy” who is going to go out of my way to help out a stranger or stop in the middle of the block to chat with the new neighbors (but Derek absolutely would!). Which perhaps is why it amazes me that I have fallen into an industry where kindness to relative strangers seems to be an unspoken prerequisite.

Certainly, we have been privy to this in CMEpalooza over the years, not so much when we reach out to people to take part in our sessions since they hopefully feel that this is something they benefit from on a professional level, but moreso when we need some sort of technical or specialized advice on the side. Virtually without exception, people go out of their way to be kind and offer whatever help we need. Often, their help goes far beyond what we expect. We’re paying back some of these “super helpers” (or burdening them excessively, depending on your perspective) by inviting them along for the ride during the upcoming anchor session of CMEpalooza Fall entitled, “Ask Us Anything: Live Rewind.”

(I could use this time to remind everyone to drop a postcard in our virtual “Ask Us Anything” mailbox if you need any personal or professional advice, but that’s not the point of today’s blog post)

In the last month, I was twice reminded of the inordinate kindness of my colleagues. Every now and then, I run into an issue in my non-Palooza duties that has me stumped. Perhaps I’m flummoxed by the non-response of a supporter, or a faculty member has ghosted me for weeks and weeks, or there is a new project I’m working on with some weird innuendos that I have never before encountered. It happens to all of us. Ideally, we have a rolodex (remember those?) of professional colleagues to whom we can reach out to get the answers we need. But there are times when we need specific information that only a select few people in the CME world have access to. These are the times I ran into recently.

I emailed reticently – I’m paraphrasing here – “You don’t know me, but I work in CME too and I’ve got a problem I’m hoping you can help with. Pretty please?” And you know what? Both times, these total strangers not only came to the rescue but they volunteered to talk me through all of the issues I was having and helped to identify some that I hadn’t thought about. Some of them sent me documents and templates that they had created to help keep them on track and encouraged me to use them as well instead of building something new from scratch that likely would have taken hours. Why? What was in it for them? Kindness. That’s apparently what people do around here.

“So tell me neighbor, it looks like you help getting up on that ladder. Anything I can do?”

(Nah, I’ll let Derek handle that one. Just doesn’t feel right yet.)

 

You may be wondering why you haven’t heard anything from Derek or I since we wrapped up CMEpalooza Spring back in April. Here is a brief story to explain…

I was recently out for a secluded hike in the North Carolina woods with a few friends of mine on a drizzly morning when we began to hear a few crackles in the distance.

Gunshots? (There were legal hunting grounds a few miles away)

Thunder? (It was raining, but no threatening dark clouds)

We concluded that the noises were most likely caused by falling trees, even though there wasn’t a wisp of wind. Of course, one of us had to trot out the old adage, “If a tree falls in the forest but no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?”

During one of our rigorous, full-day planning meetings to discuss CMEpalooza, I relayed this anecdote to Derek. He perked up immediately with one of his “Great Scott!” expressions as if he was Dr. Emmett Brown from Back to the Future.

Me: What? What did I say?

Derek: I have an idea. Bear with me for a minute. It may sound crazy. But what if we plan a Palooza, but don’t tell anyone about it. Did the Palooza still happen?

Having nothing better to do as real work piled up around us, we bandied this question back and forth for a while. I said it definitely did happen. Derek said it didn’t. We bickered like two crotchety old men in line at the grocery store (“Can you believe they are charging $3 for an avocado?”).

But then we decided, hey, let’s take the theoretical and make it practical. We’ll plan sessions, recruit panelists, schedule times, but…and here’s the key… we tell no one. No blog posts. Nothing on LinkedIn. No mentions at CMEpalooza Trivia Night coming up during AIS in September (more soon on this).

Total. Silence.

Riveting, right? You are hooked now, aren’t you? I will admit that it is amazing how creative I can be when I want to cover up for the fact that we simply have been too lazy to write up our usual cadre of new blog posts. Plus, during my hike, a tree actually fell about 10 feet from where I was walking. Fortunately, it fell away from me. Otherwise, this post would be coming to you from a hospital bed, at best (note from Derek: missed again!)

So yes, never fear, my good friends, our lazy streak is over and we are back with a very important CMEpalooza announcement.

LeBron James is a Philadelphia 76er!

Wait, wait, that’s not the one (though still quite important). Ah, here it is.

The 2026 CMEpalooza Fall agenda is officially live.

Now before you get too excited, I should include the caveat that this agenda is a work in progress. Our Gold sponsors — Med Learning Group and Daiichi Sankyo — are still finalizing the details for their sessions, while several of our other panels are filling in some of the final presenter slots. This is par for the Palooza course. But what you will see on our Agenda tab is at least a glimpse of the variety of topics and formats we have in store for you on Wednesday, October 21. We promise to have our usual fun while covering educational topics that resonate across the gamut of providers.

And yes, vacations be damned, we promise not to hibernate for the summer for too much longer.

While I was updating the CMEpalooza Archive with all the recent sessions from CMEpalooza Spring 2026, I noticed we had reached a somewhat notable milestone: CMEpalooza Spring 2026 was the 25th Palooza. Woo.

Having realized this momentous achievement, I of course immediately shared the news with Scott (note: these are our actual texts.)

Naturally, he was overwhelmed with emotion, as you can easily see from his response.

Wow, what a moment. You can really feel the love. We both took a moment to collect ourselves, and then it was right back to business.

Be careful, my enthusiasm is contagious.

In all seriousness, a big thank you to everyone for helping us make it through CMEpalooza #25! I can’t promise we will do another 25, but then, I also didn’t think we would do more than one, so what do I know?