Snowy View, Los Gatos, California

Introduction...

This was the view from the bedroom in my house in Los Gatos, California. I lived there for 10 years before moving, with my partner Matt, to a little town south of Charleston, SC so that we could be closer to our families. Moving to be closer to your parents isn’t a uniquely Southern thing do to but my experience has been that it happens a lot here in the South and seems to be a trend with people in my generation. My parents live in a house right behind ours. Its nice to be so close but still have some separation for all of us.

I am a health informaticist which is a pretty fancy term for someone who helps healthcare organizations understand and use computer systems to improve healthcare services. I work with a wide variety of organizations (information system vendors, physician practices, hospitals, and insurance companies) Last year I expanded my practice into the international market. I also run a foundation named after my grandmother, Laura Henry Hawn. The Laura Henry Hawn Foundation is funded through Ocius Medical Informatics the consulting company that my partner Matt and I own and run. The Laura Henry Hawn Foundation was formed to provide health advocacy for people who don’t have representation in the US healthcare system. As part my advocacy work I help people find affordable medications, medical services, and help people wade through the never ending paperwork and bureaucracy. I also help resolve disputes between patients and healthcare organizations (physicians, hospitals and payor organization (payor is the term we use in the industry to describe any non-patient who pays for healthcare services). My other volunteer work involves Low Country AIDS Services (LAS) here in Charleston. I help get patients to and from appointments and deliver groceries.

I also cook (self-taught and like to invent new recipes) and I love to make comedy shorts. You might want to visit my movies page to see what I am working on now. Since my job can be very technical I enjoy the opportunity to work on something totally different (which I think is the definition of a hobby) My goal is to get my first comedy short show in a film festival in 2007. We’ll see how I do.

You’ll find my opinions on a wide variety of things on my blog pages. I have two blog pages here. One is called Opinions and Stores where I periodically share stories about my life and my opinions about various social and cultural happenings. The second blog is my Travel Blog. I travel about half time now (one week in Charleston, one week out on the road)  and I like to share my stories on the road, describe who (if anyone) is actually giving great service and certainly warn people away from bad companies like Continental Airlines and of course my perennial favorite United Airlines (We love to fly but you couldn’t tell by watching us). You’ll also find humor and each month a feature video short that has caught my attention.

I also maintain a page that contains links to various web-cams. In the early 80’s when the Internet was first coming into existence for the general public I was fascinated that I could sit in my home and access data on a computer literally located half way around the world from me. As the Internet has grown and enterprising people have begun to use this medium to deliver all kinds of information I find it interesting to be at home and be able to see half way around the world.

I hope this site is full of interesting things to read, interesting places on the Internet to visit and plenty of cool pictures to see (another hobby).

Enjoy!

Todd

Last updated January 1, 2007