It was reading this thread that got me started with cyclocross. Got the bike, got the first race out of the way (really heavy mud mixed with leaves, it was slooooow), next one tomorrow.
Just getting into it this season, hopefully I'll put a bit more into it next year. It's hard but oddly fun. There's a bit of falling off involved, thankfully the probability of falling appears to be proportional to the softness of the ground.
My dismount is pretty good now, the remount is improving but still a little duff. Passable under ideal conditions, terrible in challenging terrain or when someone is watching.