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started life with the distinction of being the biggest baby ever born in Dallas Texas. Yup… no foolin’. He spent the majority of his growing up years in what was then considered the pseudo-countryside of Herndon, Virginia just west of Washington D.C. The pseudo-countryside offered plenty of fodder for the imagination and space for a boy to do what boys love most to do: catch things, break things and lose things. It’s rumored that there is a stream with a few less crayfish and a pond with one more paternal fishing pole on the bottom due to the adventures of one very energetic little boy. While excess energy and the countryside are a match made in heaven, the schoolroom was quite the opposite and Russ’s school years were marked by a love-hate relationship with most of his teachers. How can a teacher resist one sweet, adorable, happy boy (Doesn’t the thought just make you swoon, ladies?)… but on the other hand, how do you make a ball of energy sit still and learn from a book?

In his teenage years, he dabbled in a bit of magic. The original intent was to make books, homework and teachers disappear on command (and perhaps even entire schools once he mastered the art!), but for practice, he had a lot of fun doing magic shows for local kids. He was quite famous, you know, among the local magicians… the great Randini! (…oh, but after he made that one little girl’s cat disappear and couldn’t bring it back, he had to change his name to Ranzini and start all over again with a new identity.) When magic proved too tedious a method for making distasteful things disappear, he decided the brainy approach wasn’t working and wanted to try a little jock-esque brawn instead. So he bought himself a hot little sportscar and joined the high school wrestling team. Though the schoolwork didn’t disappear, it became gradually more palatable and his prowess and sheer strength on the wrestling mat eventually put him through a couple of years at Ricks College. (He was known to hike the mountains looking for wild cougars to wrestle. Once he even wrestled a grizzly bear...although the match ended in a draw when onlookers discovered the bear was stuffed.)

Ironically enough, big-blonde-n-blue-white-boy was called to serve a mission in the Phillippines where he, the walking-talking polar bear, frightened the poor, unsuspecting natives and managed to have some very profound spiritual experiences (...when he could get them to stop running!). Now, after graduating from BYU, he finds himself back in Virginia with many exciting opportunities in his future. He is planning to return to school for an MBA in the next couple of years, and would eventually like to start his own business.