Some of you who have been reading the blog for a while now may have noticed that I enjoy making lists, particularly “Top 5” lists of things I do or don’t like. This has been a lifetime passion of mine, even as a kid. I can’t tell you how excited a young Derek was to bring home a brand-new copy of The Baseball Book of Lists from Browseabout Books in Rehoboth Beach, DE, in 1983 and spend the entire day poring over its contents.

What 10-year-old wouldn’t be mesmerized by lists such as “Rod Carew’s 10 Toughest Pitchers to Hit” and “William Shakespeare’s 15 Best Baseball Quotes” and “Morganna the Kissing Bandit’s 5 Best Kissers?” (side note: No, I am not making that up. Morganna the Kissing Bandit was a real person who would travel around to various baseball parks to sneak out onto the field and kiss unsuspecting players. The 70s and 80s were wild, man.)

For a number of years, around this time of year I would put together my Top 5 Best Holiday Songs list, which usually consisted of some combination of Springsteen’s Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Wham!’s Last Christmas (there will be no Last Christmas slander on this website), and The Waitresses Christmas Wrapping. I stopped making this list about five years ago when I had the sudden epiphany that the best holiday song was, of course, Nat King Cole’s The Christmas Song, and everything else was a distant second place. This remains correct. Nothing has happened to change my mind since.  You may not want to admit it, but you know I’m right.

Much more fun is making a list of the Top 5 Worst Holiday Songs. It feels a little mean spirited to call any of these songs “worst” (though they deserve it), so I’m updating the title to the Top 5 Holiday Songs That Make Me Change the Station or Skip Ahead When They Come On. It’s a bit long, but I think effectively communicates the purpose of the list. All of these songs are very popular and have probably made the writers and performers a ton of money, so I don’t feel bad critiquing them. So, without further ado, here are the Top 5 Holiday Songs That Make Me Change the Station or Skip Ahead When They Come On:

5. Do They Know It’s Christmas? — Band Aid. The song itself is not too bad, maybe even kind of catchy. It’s on this list entirely because of the line Bono sings midway through, “”Well tonight, thank God it’s them instead of you!” Yeesh. Condescending and tone deaf. Deserves a permanent spot on this list.

4. Simply Having a Wonderful Christmas Time — Paul McCartney. Awful from the very first synthesized note. The worst earworm you can imagine. It should probably be #1 on this list, but I can’t do that to a Beatle.

3. Dominick the Donkey — Lou Monte. Holy crap is this song annoying. Yet, somehow, it is not the most annoying song on the list because song #2 exists.

2. I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas — Gayla Peevey. If nails scratching a chalkboard could be made into a holiday song, it would be this. A weird song made even less tolerable by the annoying voice singing it.

1. The Christmas Shoes — NewSong. Mawkish, self-congratulatory, poverty porn schlock. Other than that, it’s not bad.

Oh, I also updated the CMEpalooza Archive with all the sessions from CMEpalooza Fall 2025. Now you can spend your holiday break enjoying all your favorite CMEpalooza videos. You’re welcome!

To watch live CMEpalooza Fall sessions, go here: https://cmepalooza.com/live/

To watch the archived version of the CMEpalooza Fall sessions, go here: https://cmepalooza.com/fall-2025/

Where do I watch CMEpalooza Fall? You watch it on the LIVE page.

Do I have to refresh the page to watch new sessions? That is super annoying. No, you do not have to refresh the LIVE page to watch new sessions. Every session has a unique link, so just find the session you want to watch at the appropriate time and click that link to begin. Easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy.

Will people be able to hear me on the broadcast? No. You are not on the broadcast. You are only watching a video feed of the broadcast. You can sing Hey Ya! by Outkast at full volume (shaking it like a Polaroid picture) and no one will hear you except your neighbors, who might call the police, who might interrupt you while watching CMEpalooza. So, don’t sing Hey Ya! by Outkast at full volume (shaking it like a Polaroid picture) while watching CMEpalooza.

Can I watch CMEpalooza at home? Yes.

Can I watch CMEpalooza at the office? Sure.

Can I watch CMEpalooza in a conference room with 150 other people? Absolutely, if that’s what you want to do. I mean, that’s not really my cup of tea, so I’m probably the wrong person to ask. But don’t let me stop you.

Can I watch CMEpalooza with Stephen Colbert? I don’t know, let’s ask him.

He’ll have some free time in a few months, so maybe check back then.

Do I have to pre-register or register? Nope.

Do I have to pay anything to watch CMEpalooza? I love paying registration fees.

No. You don’t have to pay anything to watch CMEpalooza.

Do I have to take a survey afterward? Well, you don’t have to, but it would be nice if you did. We do read them and use them as part of our planning process. There are only a couple questions and it shouldn’t take you more than 60 seconds. If it takes you more than 60 seconds, Scott will come to your house and quietly cook you breakfast like Stanley Tucci in Big Night.

Can I get a certificate for watching CMEpalooza? Actually, yes. Well, kind of. We’re not accredited or certified or anything like that, and we have no way of verifying whether you actually watched any of these sessions or not. But if you want a certificate of completion that you can use to self-report participation in CMEpalooza Fall 2025, here you go. We’ll also post it on the LIVE page. Who knows, maybe these certificates will be worth something 200 years from now.

How do I ask questions of the presenters? There are two ways you can ask questions:

1. Send a text to the CMEpalooza text line at 267-666-0CME (0263)
2. If you open up the viewing window in YouTube (click on “Watch on YouTube” on lower left corner), you can enter in questions within the YouTube chat function.

We try to get to as many questions as we can throughout each presentation.

Do I have to watch all the sessions? YES! No. Watch what interests you.

Will the sound quality for each presenter be crystal clear with consistent volume and no glitches? I mean, really, have you been on, I don’t know, 500 web calls in the last month? Is it always perfect for everyone? Of course not. That said, we’re better with this technology stuff than the average bear – we HAVE been doing this for 11 years now so hopefully we’ve learned something. So will it be pretty good for almost every presenter? Yes, yes it will. There will be some people who sound better than others. There may be a few glitches and hiccups. That’s just how it goes with a free conference where presenters volunteer their time and use their own equipment. Some people aren’t comfortable doing a presentation while wearing headphones and a mic, so we don’t force them to use it. We do the best that we can with what we have available to us.

Will I be offended by anything during CMEpalooza? I doubt it, but who knows? If you are, please email Scott and tell him all about it in extensive detail.

What if I’m busy during the day of the live broadcast? All the sessions will be archived on the website and available to be viewed, well, immediately. How are we able to do it so fast? We have a new young intern who is a real crackerjack on the interwebs. Here he is warming up before writing a new blog post.