The Beastwood Files: September 2025

September was about puttin’ the nose to the ol’ grindstone after four weeks of being off more than I was on. I also intentionally worked half days every Monday last month, mostly to ensure I’d have time for my long runs and partly to help ease my way into the work week. (Garfield was right; no one likes Mondays.) Anyway, I have no lovely bylines to share, though I promise I was, in fact, working.

Also … as you may or may not have seen, I decided to start a monthly news roundup. The first post should go live in mid-October. As a result, I’ve decided to switch from Stuff I Read (which will be covered in said newsletter) to Stuff I Did. Is it as exciting? Probably not. Does it matter? Definitely not.

Stuff I Wrote

• Custom content for clients in digital health, healthcare data management, enterprise resource planning, and more

Stuff I Did

• I’m running the BayState Marathon in a couple weeks, so I devoted a good chunk of my non-working and non-catering-to-every-need-of-a-preschooler time to getting through the most important part of the training cycle. Now it’s taper time, which is when marathon runners rest their bodies and do their best to avoid every germ their children bring home from school.
• I started writing to voters in California through Vote Forward. I did a lot of letter-writing while watching playoff baseball, because these days even when the Red Sox are playing I still have brain space left to do other things.
• We have already done most of the stereotypical Fall New England Things: Go apple picking, buy several pumpkins, and run the heat and the air conditioning on the same day. (This is equal parts because of the weather and the insulation limitations of a 100-year-old house.) My wife had a pumpkin spice latte. I’ll break out the flannel soon enough.

Adventures in Fatherhood

• Speaking of the Red Sox, my son and I went to our first game at Fenway Park back in August. It was roughly 90 degrees, and we lasted an hour. Highlights included the bus ride (we’re lucky enough to not need to take the very crowded Green Line), seeing Wally the Green Monster, and going to Ben & Jerry’s on Brookline Avenue once we decided we were too hot for the ballpark.
• The other day, afternoon snack at school was pretzels, which my son doesn’t like. But instead of rejecting it, he asked to save it for me, since he knows I like pretzels. Kids, amirite?
• I’ve been able to apply an important lesson in parenting to working with clients. Whenever my son is asking me to get him some milk and also read him a book and oh by the way throw away a soggy tissue, I tell him, “Daddy can only do one thing at a time.” This has helped me make sure I set priorities at work, too.

Happy fall. Happy Halloween. Happy conference season to my health IT friends. Until next time.