Lopez Family blog

Back in my college days I would spend hours watching sports, it didn’t really matter what sport it was, if it was on TV I would watch it. Now with two young kids I hardly ever find the time to watch TV at all. The exception of course is the world cup.

The biggest football event in the world is something that I cannot pass up on watching. This year the world cup is particulary worth watching because of all the upsets that are playing out. My favorite of course being Mexico beating France by a score of 2-0.

France is a great example of how this tournament can be so unpredictable. My first memories are of the 1986 world cup which took place in Mexico. France had Platini who was just amazing, sadly for him that world cup also featured Diego Maradona, who many argue is a football god. France played well enough to be third, thanks mostly to Platini, there’s a highlights video here, if you’re interested.
The following world cup, Italy 1990, the French didn’t even make the finals, in fact they didn’t make it to the finals again until they hosted it in 1998. And that, of course, was the one time they’ve won the world cup led by my favorite player of all times Zidane, you can see some highlights here.
After the ’98 world cup France’s luck has been up and down, in 2002 without Zidane they went three games without scoring and were out in the group stage. In 2006 they reached the final where I’m sure all saw the infamous headbutt. But for me the best moment was Zidane’s performance against Brazil, a link to the video is here.
That brings us to today and the current world cup in South Africa. The French once again find themselves without a true leader, some argue Ribery could fill that role but I’ve yet to see that level of skill and leadership from him. And much like it was in 2002 they are out of the world cup in three games scoring a single goal.

The French aren’t the only example, there are plenty more. There is England for instance, who’ve won the cup once in 1966 when they hosted the tournament, and have consistently failed to live up to expectations ever since. Holland have never won the cup even though the play some pretty good looking football.

In the end, the reason I love the world cup so much is because of that unpredictability. Even the ‘boring’ matches turn out to be exciting, like New Zealand getting a draw against Italy, or Japan beating Cameroon. And this is just the group stages, knockout rounds should only get better.

Hopefully on July 11th we can have a ‘fresh’ final with teams that have yet to win the cup!

I’ve been at my new job for a week and yet I feel like I haven’t really started yet. Because of the birth of Gabriela, my new job gave me the opportunity to work from home during my first two weeks. These weeks are typically dedicated to learning about the company and the job. Since it is mostly presentations and videos that can be watched anywhere, this works out well for me, I can be at home with the family while getting up to speed with my knowledge.

The one thing I have noticed is that I don’t quite feel connected to my job yet. I’ve been to the office once and I’ve joined several meetings over the phone but that’s about it. It’s a rather odd feeling. Not that telecommuting is new to me, at my previous job I used to do it two days a week but it feels different. Maybe it’s the fact that I have yet to form relationships with my coworkers so I don’t quite feel like I’m a part of it quite yet.

I’m actually looking forward to working in Cambridge, my desk is in a nice part of the office with a great view of the city.

But more than the city and the great view I’m ready to get to know my new coworkers and get this new stage of my life going for real.

When it comes to life changes there are two schools of thought, do them one at a time or get them all in at once. Getting them done one at a time gives you time to assimilate the change before a new change comes along. A friend of mine believes in the other theory, that of many changes all at once. She feels that if you are going to make changes in your life, you might as well make them all at the same time to just get them over with. We, as a family, find ourselves in the midst of some life changing events that have us testing out that second theory first hand.

Our second daughter was born two weeks ago and as of this past Friday I no longer work at Gomez, the place I have worked at for the last four years.

Life at home with two little ones is not something to be taken lightly. I’d forgotten how hard it is to only sleep two hours at a time and then try to go on about your work day. One thing that I have noticed is that Gabriela seems to sleep a lot better and is able to tolerate a lot more noise than Natalia ever did. Which is good given that Natalia, who is just over two and and a half, has a voice that only comes in one volume setting… really loud!

When Natalia was born we used to think that we had no time for anything else other than taking care of her. Now that Gabriela is here, we realize how much time we did have to ourselves.

And while the home life seems to be getting settled, the work life is in full flux.

Lisa is applying for new jobs and I have a new job.

I have had a great time at what is now my old job. I’ve met great people who have thought me a lot, both personally and professionally. Four years ago when I first applied to work at Gomez, most people had never heard of it, and to be honest neither had I. It was a small 80 person company that monitored the internet. Four years on Gomez had gone on to become the leader in web application monitoring and is now part of a 5000 people corporation called Compuware.

During my time at Gomez I made many friends and came to admire many people, none more than Bill Scerra who thought me so many things, primarily how not to travel, you can read that story here.

We’ll see how the new work life works out, so far I’ve been at home reading about the company’s history and doing the overall background learning necessary for my job. Once I start going into the office we will really see how life will change. I’m sure no matter what, we’ll work out a way to keep having the great family life we’ve had so far as well as keeping our careers going.