RevZiLLa - Biography


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Biography My name is Lou. I was born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana but really don't remember it much because we left when I was 4 years old. All I remember about Louisiana was the visits to New Orleans, the restaurants, and Mardi Gras... Who could forget Mardi Gras! Well I guess I also remember my Father taking me fishing to a place called False River when I was a toddler. We went all the time, but more about that in the Fishing Section, OK. Let's just say my Dad and me went EVERYWHERE together. My family moved from Baton Rouge to Los Angeles where we settled in a suburb called Arcadia; that's right next to Pasadena, where the Rose Bowl parade is held. We stayed there until I graduated high school at age 17. It was a time when Jerry West and Elgin Baylor were the driving force for The Lakers, and Dad got us seats to the games right behind the LA bench. Sandy Coulfax and Don Drysdale were legendary with the Dodgers in those days, and we had box seats right behind home plate. I hated those seats because the nets meant we could never catch a foul ball. It was great growing up in LA except for two things...EArThQuAkEs, and cement. Everything was surrounded by cement and all laid out in straight lines and square corners. I used to dream of going fishing, but the only running water I knew was in the cement gutter in front of the house, so I would dream of sitting on the curb with a fishing pole and a bobber dangling in the runoff. Another great thing about LA in those days was the HIPPIES. There were Love-Ins in the park down the street. Girls were burning bra's and guys were burning draft cards. Everybody was experimenting with sex...and drugs. I tried it but I never inhaled...OK!!!!! Dad got a new job in Richmond, Virginia and we moved from Los Angeles. We moved from warm climates to cold...from trees living in cement squares to mountains and woods, from running water in cement gutters to the mighty James River...from the land of Hollywood perfect enunciation to the land of the Southern drawl, Y'all... I attended Virginia Commonwealth University and earned a BS in Business Sciences, Finance with a 3.4 GPA. I also went fishing every day in the James River in between classes. What a babe-magnet I was, coming to class all muddy and smelling of fish! From Richmond, I moved to Harrisburg, PA and lived with my parents (Dad had another new job) while attending Penn State University as a visiting student. Then I went to Baltimore, MD, where I attended The University of Baltimore Law School for 2 years...that's right, only two years out of the three required. I decided against becoming an attorney, but I'm glad I went because I learned a lot and I met Margaret, who is now my wife of 26 years. Margaret and I moved to Austin, TX. I had $1,200 to my name and spent it on a deposit for an apartment, a color TV, and a honeymoon in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. We got married, went on our honeymoon, and then we came back and I started looking for a job. Her Dad really liked that...NOT! I got a job managing a convenience store and progressed to where I was in charge of a group of them. This is how I put my wife through school. She became a Chemical Engineer and I am very proud of her. It was a pretty bad job when I was a store manager, but it was even worse when I was promoted and was expected to treat the store managers the way I had been treated. SO I QUIT! I attended The University of Texas at Austin and earned an MBA in Information Systems Management with a 3.9 GPA and graduated with honors. That crummy job I had quit taught me that I had better learn to study and achieve if I wanted a better life...so I did! My wife had returned the favor and put ME through school this time. We also bought our first house and learned about landscaping and gardening and gourmet cooking. After graduate school, I accepted a job with EXXON in Houston. I was in charge of their Retail Accounting Systems and took a process that broke down 235 times a year and modified it to break down only 3 times that year. One of those times, I got a call at 3AM and was told that the books were $10,000,000,000.00 out of balance...now THAT WILL WAKE YOU UP! Strange that it was such a round amount, huh... Well, it turned out that the variable that held a total was too small by one digit to hold the number being put into it...truncation error. After a few years with EXXON, my family got the opportunity to start a marketing business. I moved to Richmond, VA and my Father and Brother and I started a small company that grew to $75,000,000.00 in sales and employed 250 people. We started and ran 3 successful businesses, one of which is still under our control today. When we started up, I thought..."HA! I'll never be like those big-wigs in EXXON who laid people off. Life will be great!" Well, sometimes life was great and sometimes it was not...and I DID have to lay people off a couple times. Now I respect the men I worked for at EXXON who made those hard decisions. While in Richmond, I have gotten back into fishing and bowling. I have also learned a lot about home improvement. The most striking thing is that the friends I left in Richmond in the 70's are still here and they're still friends after all that time! I guess that's because they're BOWLING FRIENDS...real friends.
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Biography

My name is Lou. I was born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana but really don't remember it much because we left when I was 4 years old. All I remember about Louisiana was the visits to New Orleans, the restaurants, and Mardi Gras...

Who could forget Mardi Gras!

Well I guess I also remember my Father taking me fishing to a place called False River when I was a toddler. We went all the time, but more about that in the Fishing Section, OK. Let's just say my Dad and me went EVERYWHERE together.

My family moved from Baton Rouge to Los Angeles where we settled in a suburb called Arcadia; that's right next to Pasadena, where the Rose Bowl parade is held.

We stayed there until I graduated high school at age 17. It was a time when Jerry West and Elgin Baylor were the driving force for The Lakers, and Dad got us seats to the games right behind the LA bench. Sandy Coulfax and Don Drysdale were legendary with the Dodgers in those days, and we had box seats right behind home plate. I hated those seats because the nets meant we could never catch a foul ball.

It was great growing up in LA except for two things...EArThQuAkEs,

and cement. Everything was surrounded by cement and all laid out in straight lines and square corners. I used to dream of going fishing, but the only running water I knew was in the cement gutter in front of the house, so I would dream of sitting on the curb with a fishing pole and a bobber dangling in the runoff.

Another great thing about LA in those days was the HIPPIES. There were Love-Ins in the park down the street. Girls were burning bra's and guys were burning draft cards. Everybody was experimenting with sex...and drugs.

I tried it but I never inhaled...OK!!!!!

Dad got a new job in Richmond, Virginia and we moved from Los Angeles. We moved from warm climates to cold...from trees living in cement squares to mountains and woods, from running water in cement gutters to the mighty James River...from the land of Hollywood perfect enunciation to the land of the Southern drawl, Y'all... I attended Virginia Commonwealth University and earned a BS in Business Sciences, Finance with a 3.4 GPA. I also went fishing every day in the James River in between classes.

What a babe-magnet I was, coming to class all muddy and smelling of fish!

From Richmond, I moved to Harrisburg, PA and lived with my parents (Dad had another new job) while attending Penn State University as a visiting student. Then I went to Baltimore, MD, where I attended The University of Baltimore Law School for 2 years...that's right, only two years out of the three required. I decided against becoming an attorney, but I'm glad I went because I learned a lot and I met Margaret, who is now my wife of 26 years.

Margaret and I moved to Austin, TX. I had $1,200 to my name and spent it on a deposit for an apartment, a color TV, and a honeymoon in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. We got married, went on our honeymoon, and then we came back and I started looking for a job.

Her Dad really liked that...NOT!

I got a job managing a convenience store and progressed to where I was in charge of a group of them. This is how I put my wife through school. She became a Chemical Engineer and I am very proud of her. It was a pretty bad job when I was a store manager, but it was even worse when I was promoted and was expected to treat the store managers the way I had been treated.

SO I QUIT!

I attended The University of Texas at Austin and earned an MBA in Information Systems Management with a 3.9 GPA and graduated with honors. That crummy job I had quit taught me that I had better learn to study and achieve if I wanted a better life...so I did! My wife had returned the favor and put ME through school this time. We also bought our first house and learned about landscaping and gardening and gourmet cooking.

After graduate school, I accepted a job with EXXON in Houston. I was in charge of their Retail Accounting Systems and took a process that broke down 235 times a year and modified it to break down only 3 times that year. One of those times, I got a call at 3AM and was told that the books were $10,000,000,000.00 out of balance...now THAT WILL WAKE YOU UP! Strange that it was such a round amount, huh... Well, it turned out that the variable that held a total was too small by one digit to hold the number being put into it...truncation error. After a few years with EXXON, my family got the opportunity to start a marketing business.

I moved to Richmond, VA and my Father and Brother and I started a small company that grew to $75,000,000.00 in sales and employed 250 people. We started and ran 3 successful businesses, one of which is still under our control today. When we started up, I thought..."HA! I'll never be like those big-wigs in EXXON who laid people off. Life will be great!" Well, sometimes life was great and sometimes it was not...and I DID have to lay people off a couple times. Now I respect the men I worked for at EXXON who made those hard decisions.

While in Richmond, I have gotten back into fishing and bowling. I have also learned a lot about home improvement. The most striking thing is that the friends I left in Richmond in the 70's are still here and they're still friends after all that time! I guess that's because they're BOWLING FRIENDS...real friends.