More or less, anyway. I passed the lists from Des Moines Content Nerds on to Quentin for Experiencing UX. He invited me back to keynote World IA Day Des Moines in February. The Kristina Halvorson invited herself to present to our meetup group when it was still Content Nerds, and now I work for her. (Amanda Costello also spoke to our group, and has been a consistent positive presence in my life.)
Running the meetup also reinforced my hare-brained theory that spending a little money (as opposed to no money) on things to support your career can give you a big advantage. Running my portfolio site isn’t free, and neither was the Meetup group, but both have paid big dividends.