Tis’ the season of CMEpalooza giving…

First, we had last week’s special sponsor event, CMEpalooza Meets the Golden Bachelor, where we gave away $500 in Amazon gift cards. We’re in the midst of the CMEpalooza STEPtacular Challenge, sponsored by Talem Health, for all of you exercise types (it ends Friday so still time to “step on up” to the challenge). That’s another giveaway of $500 in Amazon gift cards.

And now I’m here today to announce another special giveaway event that is going to put some food in your belly and keep some change in your pocket (does anyone keep change anymore? Let’s just assume for now that the answer is yes). It’s the return of our CMEpalooza Feeds the People promotion, this year sponsored by epocrates®.

I am not a breakfast guy so I consider lunch personally to be the most important meal of the day. I love a good sandwich and will often search far and wide to add a new stop to my list. My friends and family are probably tired of hearing me talk about my favorite sandwich in the whole wide world (it’s called Give Me Liverty or Give Me Schmaltz! and is served at Kenny and Ziggy’s New York Delicatessen in Houston, TX). I desperately wish I could have it delivered to me, but it’s a few thousand miles door to door. Probably a good thing for my cholesterol level.

But that doesn’t mean that you can’t enjoy my favorite sandwich, or whatever other lunch delicacy seems particularly enticing, when CMEpalooza Fall rolls around next Wednesday, Oct. 18. And best of all, we’re picking up the tab!

Here are the very simple “rules” of CMEpalooza Feeds the People:

1. Click on this link to sign up for your $20 Grubhub gift card
2. It’s a very simple registration process. You don’t have to do any research or complete any onerous tasks. Just give us your email and tell us why you eat three bowls of Count Chocula for breakfast every morning.
3. We’re giving away 75 of these gift cards – that’s a lot of free food! One per customer.
4. For our “winners,” we’ll be sending a electronic Grubhub gift card over early in the morning of CMEpalooza Fall. Our hope is that this giveaway will allow you to order lunch delivery so that you can watch each and every session of CMEpalooza Fall without leaving your home or office. You never know what tidbit you might miss that will revolutionize your professional life, so better to nosh and listen through your noontime meal.
5. Based on previous years, we expect this promotion to fill up quickly, so probably best not to hem and haw too much. Again, click here to sign up.

CMEpalooza Feeds the People sponsored by:

We wrapped up another successful sponsor event on Friday, with thousands of entries into our CMEpalooza Meets the Golden Bachelor event pouring in from around the world. But alas, while everyone may have wanted the golden rose–or in this case, the $100 Amazon gift card–there could only be a few lucky winners.

Here they are:

• Cindy Davidson, Editorial Manager, Scientific Affairs, Global Learning Collaborative
• Javeshia Melton, BS, CME Program Specialist/ Medical Library, UF Health St. Johns
• Dana Zook, Assistant Director, Program Development, ASHP
• Courtney Samples, Continuing Medical Education Coordinator, CME Services, Legacy Health
• Melissa Ketchum, CHCP, FACEHP, Director, Continuing Education, Annenberg Center for Health Sciences at Eisenhower

Thanks to everyone who entered, and congrats to our winners!

We launched our latest sponsor event, cleverly entitled “CMEpalooza Meets the Golden Bachelor” on Monday morning. As usual, we got an initial flood of entrants that has now slowed to a trickle as everyone, in the usual “I have a 2-minute attention span” approach to life, has moved on.

Maybe this little tête-à-tête with Derek will get your attention back to what is important: namely, entering our little contest so you can win some mad guap to pay for a fancy new pair of kicks (translation: money for shoes).

DEREK: OMG, OMG, OMG, OMG!!

SCOTT: You all right there, chief?

DEREK: I just saw Susan at the Acme!

SCOTT: Who is Susan? Is that the woman you hit with your car last year?

DEREK: No, not that Susan! Susan from the Golden Bachelor! She was in the checkout line in front of me. You’ll never guess what kind of apples she buys!

SCOTT: You are right, I won’t.

DEREK: McIntosh! McIntosh apples! Isn’t that amazing?

SCOTT: Fascinating. Truly.

DEREK: I think I’m going to write her a haiku to tell her how much I am rooting for her to win Gerry’s heart. Maybe something like this:

Susan, you are sweet
Like a McIntosh apple
XO from Derek

SCOTT: Amazing. Truly amazing.

DEREK: I know, right?

SCOTT: Don’t you have some work to do? Didn’t I ask you to score some of our entries?

DEREK: Like I have time for that. Can’t you just do it like you always do? I’m too busy on the Golden Bachelor message forums.

SCOTT: (Sighs) Fine.

Whether or not you are totally engrossed like Derek in the Golden Bachelor show, I know you are all able to multitask (note from Derek: you can tell this is a fake conversation because I would never write a haiku that terrible.) So please, for the love of Susan, go ahead and complete our special sponsor event before Friday at 5 pm ET. If nothing else, it’ll give you a chance to explore some of the innovative work our sponsors are doing right now. There is some pretty cool stuff going on.

One more thing: This isn’t your only chance to win money prior to CMEpalooza Fall. On Monday, we’ll kick off the CMEpalooza STEPtacular Challenge, sponsored by Talem Health. Maybe you can get some steps in while going apple picking. Full rules coming shortly.