Steve Ressler

It’s time for the annual Steve Ressler update.  For those that don’t know, this is my attempt to revive the tradition of writing actual updates in holiday cards.  Yes, your baby/dog is cute in your holiday card you sent but I’m still not satisfied.  That holiday card with just a signature in it- time to step it up.  The New Year Facebook status update about resolution - not having it.

2011 turned out to be a fun year.  The big news of the year was that I finally got married.  After 6 years, 364 days of dating, I proposed in February in Vero Beach, FL.  Shockingly, Eli actually said yes and 7 months later in late September we were getting married in a small reception with friends and family in Sarasota, FL.  The wedding was a blast - my friend Deacon Andy K delivering an awesome ceremony involving a Target bag and spatulas plus lots of good speeches with Justin Bieber props, standing on chairs, and large cards revealing the “real” Steve + Eli.  The day was complete with some old-fashioned Ohio dancing and the classy cocktail Catalan Seabreeze (aka snakejuice).

We were lucky enough to continue to get some good travel in 2011.  We had a great honeymoon in Portland, Maine where we ate some insanely good food and did a lot of nothing (aka afternoon movies, outlet mall shopping).  Earlier in the year, we went to London and Paris for a work trip where we decided that London actually has good food and Paris needs to step up its wi-fi game.   During a quick trip to Germany, I got to give a talk where I had an earpiece translator like the movie Interpreter and I saw ping-pong tables in parks (awesome!).   I somehow convinced Eli to travel to South Bend to watch USF beat Notre Dame in football before the team started its annual second half of the season collapse.  We celebrated Memorial Day in style with my father speaking at a hilarious small town ceremony in Shallotte, NC, spent Thanksgiving in DC with my step-sister Megan hosting for the first time, and had a great Christmas in Cincinnati with my mother, sister, and nephew Hux.

If you haven’t noticed from my perhaps too often Facebook posts about it, things continue to go well in my work in GovLoop-land.  We hit 50,000 members this fall and gave out free food (BBQ & Mac’n cheese) to over 500 govies at food trucks throughout DC.  Our team continues to grow (double digits with our fellows) in our new DC office leading to daily epic ping pong games on our new table (downside of living in Tampa is that I don’t get to join them enough).  We were featured in cool books like Macrowikinomics, Wikibrands, in the UN E-gov report, and started writing a weekly column for the Washington Post. My ADD continues and as such we’ve launched a ton of new products from a jobs site, weekly podcast, while gearing up for a big launch in mid-January.  Shameless plug alert - if not a member, join.  If a member, check back in as have even more cool stuff going on.

All is well with the rest of the Ressler family.  My sister is in St. Louis for the year as my brother-in-law is in his 17th year of a MD/PhD/Post-Doc/Fellowship/whatever….but she’s used the time to become a prolific blogger (vocabgal.com), teaching nephew Hux the finer points of life (such as how to beat his uncle in Candyland), and gear up for baby #2 (opening in late March).  My mother somehow became addicted to text messaging and her iPad this year which is both really impressive & scary when every email she sends has that “Sent from my iPad” taunting me at the bottom.  My step-sister Megan and her husband (I mean my brodini) Adam are doing good in DC - I officially knew Megan was a grown-up when we got to their home late at night from my bachelor party andthere were 8 prepared snacks and Gatorade lined up - it was like my friend’s Newton’s suburban basement from childhood.  My Dad and step-mom continue to live it up in the classy Shallotte, NC where Eli had an awesome spa beach weekend (I think my dad did a bad cabana boy performance) and my dad randomly is into the bobbleheads I keep on buying him (Jim Morrison, Jimi Hendrix).

Eli and I continue to enjoy Tampa.  Eli continues to professor-ize at USF, where she spent the year publishing papers that help her get tenure but have 1/100000000 of the readership of her favorite cat blog.  My teaching experience consisted of talking to a 6th grade class about the Internet this year - when I asked them what websites they would create, one young girl said “iamnotaleprechaun.com because just cause I’m short and red-headed does not mean I’m a leprechaun.”  I agree.  Other highlights of our Tampa life include a brand new USF campus gym, more friends with babies, and a new coffee shop within walking distance to our house.  Plus I finally came around and decided that seasons are over-rated and the winter in Florida is awesome.

As always some things I’m randomly into - Kid Robot toys, buying weird bobbleheads as gifts for people, Spotify, my iphone 4s, my American Apparel hoodie, 50/50 shirts, How to Make it In America, Homage, Drake, pannini grill, mojitos, Vanguard Dividend Appreciation Index Fund, 1st class upgrades from Delta, and being married

And some things I’m not - Trying to get my pupil distance for new glasses, the lady who measured me wrong for my wedding suit, our terrible wedding planners (although they allowed Eli to put any stress and frustration at them not me..so thats good), cubicles, spammers, annoying push notifications, and not being able to refinance at lower rates cause of Florida home prices

Hope 2012 is a great year for everyone.  Best part of life is spending time with friends.  So make sure to visit me + Eli in Florida.  Message me when I’m coming to D.C.  Give me a call.  Or hit the Like button a little more often.