The Dispatch
Raising neurodivergent kids with systems thinking and patience. · View all
Adler Planetarium and Artemis II: When the Whole Family Gets Curious
We visited the Adler Planetarium around the Artemis II launch window, and something clicked. The kids didn't just tolerate the trip. They drove it.
Neurodivergent Family Planning: Wills, Trusts, and Thinking Beyond Our Lifetime
Every parent worries about what happens to their kids if they're not around. When your children are neurodivergent, that worry has additional dimensions, and the planning required goes beyond a standard will and life insurance policy.
Observability at Work and at Home: The Case for Early Intervention
The same principle applies everywhere: if you wait until the system is on fire to start looking at metrics, you've already lost. Early signals exist. You just have to be watching.
The Transition Home: It's OK to Need a Moment
Without a commute to decompress, the transition from 'engineering manager' to 'dad' happens in the time it takes to walk down a hallway. That's not enough, and pretending it is helps no one.
Finding Time for Self-Care When the Calendar Says No
You can't pour from an empty cup, but nobody tells you that the cup has a slow leak and the only time to refill it is 5:30 AM or never.
Traveling with Kids: Parenting in a Different ZIP Code
Travel doesn't pause the parenting. It just changes the variables. The routines still matter, the needs don't shrink, and the meltdowns have new triggers you haven't mapped yet.
Fun First: Extracurriculars Without the Pressure
Swim class isn't about producing an Olympic athlete. Ninja gymnastics isn't about competition prep. The goal is joy, body confidence, and one more environment where my kids feel capable.
Minecraft, Hackathons, and the Case for Unstructured Creativity
My kid builds redstone contraptions with no spec and no deadline. My engineers build their best prototypes under the same conditions. The pattern isn't a coincidence.
Lowest Common Denominators: Managing 13 Engineers and 2 Kids
Both roles require the same voice: not a dictator, but a facilitator who removes blockers. The overlap is bigger than you think.
LLMs as a Parenting Copilot: Using AI to Translate the World
I'm not asking an LLM to parent for me. I'm asking it to help me translate the world into a format my kids can process.
Fishing with Kids: Shore to Boat, Rocks to Reels
It started on shore with grandparents, tangled lines, and thrown rocks. Eventually the kids wanted to try the boat. Fishing turned out to be one of the better family reset buttons we've found.
Incident Response at Home
In the datacenter, when a server goes down, we don't scream at the hardware. We look for the root cause. Why should a meltdown be any different?
Change Management at Home
In infrastructure, we phase rollouts because we know that too much change at once causes outages. At home, the same principle applies, just with higher emotional stakes.