There has recently been a lot of chatter in the news about two old men past their prime who continue to hang on and chase yet another run at glory. I understand that you might not have caught this important information with all of the wall-to-wall coverage of the political upheaval we’re currently going through, so I have transcribed the audio feed from Public Access Channel 78 in Oshkosh, WI, for you:

NEWS ANCHOR #1: In other national news, the agenda for CMEpalooza Fall was released last week. It’s pretty amazing, dontcha know..

NEWS ANCHOR #2: Is that still those Derek and Scott guys? Haven’t they retired yet? I mean, I don’t want to offend anyone, but I believe they both were around when you mailed out CME certificates to learners. Like, in the mail.

OK, fine, Derek and I are now “old man joke” punching bags since we both passed the half-century mark, but that’s OK. Our doctors tell us we are mentally “capable” (it is weird that our doctors both used hand quotes when they told us? I didn’t think so), so we are soldiering on with another iteration of CMEpalooza Fall this October.

I don’t mean to brag (which means that I absolutely do mean to brag), but CMEpalooza is kind of killing it these days. Our blog topped 1,000 subscribers earlier this year and we smashed our previous record with 1,668 individuals tuning into our Spring event. That means a large swath of the CME community is paying attention to what we’re doing and saying every single day. Yes, we’re just as surprised as you are.

Of course, along with our live broadcast date on Wednesday, October 16, comes our usual slew of sponsorship opportunities. This is the best chance to show the CME world how your company is rolling with the times, how supportive you are of your professional community, and how much you love old people like Derek (I am much, much younger than he is).

And as our events evolve, so do our sponsorship opportunities. While we have a lot of the “old standbys,” we’ve thrown in some new wrinkles once again this year, many of which we successfully piloted at our recent events. Don’t be shy about taking a leap of faith and committing to something new.

Feel free to take a look at the updated Sponsorship prospectus (just click the link). We make the sponsorship process simple – you just send me an email saying something like, “CMEpalooza is like a fine wine – it gets better with age. Please count «Company» in as a (Silver/Bronze/other) sponsor,” we collect some basic information from you, and VOILA! up you go on the CMEpalooza website. You get in on all of our promotions and special events, and you receive as much exposure as we can possibly offer.

Of course, if you have any questions or would like any additional information, please don’t hesitate to ask. We’ll be sitting on our rocking chairs out on the porch with our lemonades and will be happy to take a few moments to answer whatever questions you have. Just make sure it’s no later than 9 p.m. – we have early bedtimes these days.

A 100% accurate, not-at-all-made-up text exchange between Scott and I.

Derek: OK, the CMEpalooza Fall agenda is in pretty good shape. We still have a couple sessions that will need some updating over the next few weeks, but we can at least give everyone a pretty good idea of what to expect. I think we can go ahead and release it tomorrow. What do you think?

Scott: 

Derek: Hello? Anyone there?

Scott:

Derek: Hello? Scott? You there? Kind of important. Could use your opinion.

Scott: Sorry, sorry. Cell reception is a little spotty here in Italy.

Derek: Wait, what? Italy? What the heck are you doing in Italy? It’s agenda release time! No vacations, remember? We’re all supposed to be focused on the agenda — no distractions.

Scott: No, no, it’s all good. I’m totally focused on the agenda. I’ve been thinking about it all day. Look, here’s a picture my wife took of me deep in thought.

 

 

 

 

Derek: That is a picture of Pierce Brosnan drinking a glass of wine.

Scott: No, it’s me thinking about the agenda in Italy. A common mistake, though. People get us mixed up all the time. (note from Scott: just like people commonly confuse Derek with Patrick Dempsey. We all have our cross to bear)

Derek: Right. Anyway, what are your thoughts on the CMEpalooza Fall agenda? OK to send it out tomorrow?

Scott: I think the agenda is as fine as the glass of pinot grigio I am sipping in that picture.

Derek: Super. I’ll handle it from here. Go back to your deep thinking/wine sipping.

Scott: You got this, buddy!

While Scott is out touring around Italy, I’m here to announce the working agenda for CMEpalooza Fall 2024, There are still a few details needed to round out the final agenda, but you can see that we have tried to put together a program with a little something for everyone. We have traditional topics, original topics, and mystery topics. We have old TV shows (This is Your Life), old music (The Clash), and old party games (spin the bottle). We have old faces, new faces, and faces yet to be determined.

Though you may be distracted this morning by watching the hammer throw, sabre fencing, canoe slalom, or whatever Summer Olympic events are currently on, please take a moment to check out the Fall agenda and mark it on your calendar. We’ll see you on Wednesday, October 16!

 

The definition of gallivanting is “to visit or go to a lot of different places, enjoying yourself and not worrying about other things you should be doing.” The definition of traipsing is “to walk or move wearily or reluctantly.” I bring this to your attention because in last week’s blog post, Scott wrote that I spent the first part of July “…traipsing through the countryside of Ireland where the thermometer never cracked 65 degrees.”

This is incorrect. I was not traipsing. I was definitely gallivanting through the countryside (and cityside) of Ireland, enjoying myself and not worrying about other things that I should be doing. My wife, as usual, planned out an amazing agenda, which, as usual, she shared with me as a read-only Google doc. I’ve learned not to take it personally when she does this. It’s not like I would dare make any edits to the itinerary anyway.

As I was gallivanting around Ireland, I made note of several things that I found myself asking, why don’t we have this here? (by “here” I mean “the U.S.”) Here are a few examples: (please note that I realize that half of these examples are pub-related, and it’s only half because I held back other pub-related examples. This perhaps gives you an idea of what a good amount of my gallivanting consisted of. I’ll also note that some of these are not necessarily specific to Ireland and can also be found in the U.K. and other part of Europe. You get my point, though.)

Lager. But Derek, you are probably thinking to yourself, we have lager in the U.S. True, but not lager like this. In my neck of the woods, if you walk into a bar and ask for a lager, you are going to get a Yuengling Traditional Lager. It is amber colored and, how should I put this…not good. Order a lager in Ireland (or England., Scotland, etc.) and you get something light, bubbly, frothy, and delicious. It’s delightful!

Toasties. A toastie is basically just a grilled sandwich. Grilled cheese, grilled ham and cheese, tuna melt (true story: I had four tuna melts during my trip. I regret nothing.), etc. They’re basically a less pretentious panini. Yes, we have grilled sandwiches here, but toastie is more fun to say and in Ireland they are ubiquitous. You can walk into any pub and order some kind of a toastie and it will be great.

Hurling. No, not the kind of hurling you might do after having too many lagers and toasties at the pub. I’m talking about the sport of hurling. Have you watched this? I barely understand the rules or the scoring, but it looks to me like a cross between field hockey, lacrosse, and mixed-martial arts. It’s great fun to watch and I may have booed the bartender at the Hairy Lemon when he switched the TV from hurling to rugby. How will I know if Donegal won??

Whimsy. One of the places we stayed during our trip was the charming seaside town of Carlingford. In addition to beautiful views, hikes, and great pubs, Carlingford is also home to Ireland’s last remaining Leprechaun whisperer and, conveniently, the last living Leprechauns (there are 236). There is a cute little Leprechaun themed park which is very sweet and endearing. You can’t help but smile when you are there. We need more things like this in the world.

My sister is a college anatomy and physiology professor, and sometimes when she is telling me about different things she is doing with her class, I find myself asking, why don’t we have this here? (by “here” I mean “CME.”) There are so many different educators out there working in so many different fields, it seems a little silly to me that we don’t tap into more of these resources to find out what else is out there. We try to make an effort at doing this with CMEpalooza,, and you will hear from some new voices in the Fall agenda, but one thing we could do a better job of is busting outside of our CME bubble to find faculty from other areas. I would love to hear from anyone who might have good suggestions.

We hope to have an update for the CMEpalooza Fall agenda by the end of the month. In the meantime, I’ll be looking for some place in Philadelphia where I can have a decent lager and toastie while watching hurling with a Leprechaun.