1. Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem, and Madness
Joe Exotic was married to not one, but two men at the same time. Throughout the documentary, you get the sense that neither of these men are willing partners. It is revealed that much of the relationship with these two young men was fostered upon their drug addiction. Seeking a reliable source of shelter and narcotics, these men fell victim to Joe’s charismatic personality and infallible drug supply. Centering around Joe’s strange relationships with his employees, and an investor named Jeff Lowe, the entire saga of Joe Exotic is laid out in front of you. From his peculiar entrance into the world of Zoo Keeping, through a strange plot to kill his nemesis and rival Tiger Owner, to his current situation – prison.
Carole Baskin, the owner of Big Cat Rescue, is introduced later in the series. She is the rival Tiger owner that Joe plotted to murder. She is purported to be an opponent of Joe Exotic, with the series delving into numerous legal and media battles the two had squared off in. Carole promotes herself to be a hero for Big Cats with an animal sanctuary designed to rehabilitate and rehome Tigers that have been kept in homes as pets or used in the entertainment realm. While these ideals on the surface seem to be legitimate, you come to find through the series that she has a facility that is similar if not inferior to Joe Exotic’s and is run much in the same way with Carole profiting from visitors and volunteers coming into the park.
Along with the help of Jeff Lowe and his horrifying assistant/hitman Alan, Joe produces a plan to hire Alan to kill Carole Baskin. The ensuing misfortunes for Joe are dramatic and devastating. Alan runs off with the money given to him to carry out the plan, Jeff Lowe turns out to be an informant for the Feds, and Joe learns that he will need to leave the park immediately as Jeff discovers some financial deceptions that he has been practicing. Among this, Joe also loses one of his husbands to an accidental suicide that his employees say changed the course of his life. Joe also was exposed to have been posting to social media suggesting details of this plot, which ultimately led to the end for Joe Exotic. Getting into the entirety of the details surrounding the ins and outs of this case would take hundreds of pages.
This is all summed up in a 10 part series that is well worth watching in an 11-hour, one sitting binge. I didn’t even touch on the third Tiger Owner profiled in the series; Doc Antel, who believes it or not even stranger than Joe or Carole. Along with multiple other characters that make this documentary super appealing, the subject matter alone is enough to make you question everything you know about Oklahoma, Love, and Tigers every 3 minutes during the episodes, and for the rest of your life afterward.
2. Ozark: Season 3
This is a bit of a deviation from the other series on this list, but it’s just too good not to include. If you’re not already familiar with the first two seasons of the Netflix Original Ozarks, it is my recommendation that you stop everything immediately and spend the next 48 hours finishing them. You can come back to this article when you’re done and thank me because this is the best show on Netflix by far.
Centered around a Financial Advisor named Marty Byrde that has gotten tangled up in business dealings with the Cartel. After his partner is exposed by the Cartel and their Boss Del, to be stealing money from the operation by adjusting the weight of the trucks coming in with the Cartel’s exports, he is forced to move his family to the Ozark Mountains of Missouri and begin laundering even more money for his partners. Without being able to keep the secret from their children, Marty and his wife Wendy are tasked with rallying their family around the new reality of their situation.
As one would expect, nothing goes according to plan for the Byrde’s as they begin their operations in the Ozarks. One after the other, Marty finds that the people closest to him are not always out for his best interests. Persistently through the show, he is let down by his employees and family in the highest-stakes situations that arise. Falling victim to the greed of a family of rednecks, the Langmores, Marty is forced to include members of the family in his operation – leaving him open to more problems down the road.
Ruth Langmore is the oldest of the Langmore children and muscles her way to a position as Marty’s assistant and go-to employee. She becomes more of both an ally and an enemy as the episodes and seasons progress leaving you to wonder where her intentions and loyalties lie. Along with multiple other antagonists that come along during the series, Marty is tasked with handling these liabilities as they become real problems and start to affect not only his business dealings – but also his family’s safety.
The tough decisions Marty is forced to make throughout the series set up a foundation for the third season to be extremely climactic. Every choice he makes comes back to influence him in some way or another. The third season ends with yet another new plotline that will leave you reeling and begging for the next season. Once you’ve gotten through with all three of the Ozark seasons, feel free to let me know how right I was.
3. Killer Inside: The mind of Aaron Hernadez
Aaron Hernandez is one of the most polarizing figures from the NFL in recent years. The star wide receiver from the New England Patriots provided years of high-octane entertainment on the Football field and generated an enormous fan base that stretched across the planet. He was promoted as a hero in the Latin Community and was an active and vocal supporter for underprivileged Hispanic Communities around the United States. Many viewed him as one of the only truly successful Hispanic Players and athletes of his time.
This Documentary series focuses on the later part of Hernandez’s life – from the time he was arrested on murder charges and when he ended his life in prison. The poignant series visits multiple serious and sensitive topics including that of Aaron’s sexuality. From the start of the series, you’re introduced to various figures from his past, including coaches, teammates, and friends. One of his seemingly closest friends reveals that he and Aaron had not only had a close friendship but also that they experimented with one another sexually and developed an intimate relationship with each other. This comes as a huge surprise in the Documentary and is followed up with multiple other sources expressing similar experiences and information about the subject. The Documentary series speculates that the potential breaking of this news was the driving factor of his suicide.
Beyond the seriousness of the charges brought against Hernandez, the series also spends time highlighting the extent of his athletic abilities. From early in his life, Hernandez was extremely gifted in multiple sports. Teammates and coaches reminisce about past games and experiences with him fondly and express their extreme shock and confusion upon hearing the news about his legal troubles.
Others in the series are more vocal about their distaste for Hernandez regarding these issues, many of them also being former coaches, friends, and teammates. A multitude of legal representatives including police, lawyers, and jury members are introduced as well and express the facts about the horrible crimes that he was accused of.
These parallel storylines make this a series extremely compelling and leave you wondering exactly where you stand in terms of Aaron Hernandez. He is accused of gang-related murders, traced back to his early college and professional careers in Football. While he was making money playing sports, he was also involved in criminal activity on the side, leading him to be involved in multiple shootings and killings. The criminal case against him is laid out in the series, giving you a deep look inside the charges brought against him. It also offers an intimate look at his final days and family relationships in Prison. He struggles to be available and strong for his family, often breaking down over the phone with his Wife on the line, wishing things could be different. It is often met with hard reality from his Wife, letting him know that her life is just as badly destroyed as his and that it was entirely due to his actions.
The end of the series highlights the legal situation that Hernandez was facing, as well as the financial troubles that his family now faced with him behind bars. Since he was playing for the Patriots up to the day before he was incarcerated, he still had a substantial amount of money left over on his contract. One of his final phone calls with his Wife detailed his plans to make sure that she would receive that money – no matter what. Some legal experts theorize that Hernandez took his own life in prison in an attempt to escape a legal verdict, and put pressure on the Patriots organization to honor his contract without being able to dismiss it due to legal issues. This turned out to be something that didn’t work out in this way at all.
The series is truly heartbreaking, but also strangely inspiring. The tools that Hernandez naturally possessed were incredible and were an inspiration to millions around the world. His meteoric rise to success and dedication to his community and those within Hispanic communities is a story that will keep you rooting for the underdogs. The same story does a very good job of conveying the dangers of having too much. In the same way that he rose from obscurity, he fell from grace just as dramatically. This serves as a potential warning to those interested in getting involved in criminal activity with the hopes of making money. Even those with more money than you could possibly need to fall victim to the same traps.
Watching this series, you’ll be left with a new perspective on what it means to be an athlete, a friend, a father, and a functioning member of society.
4. How to Fix a Drug Scandal
How to Fix a Drug Scandal is another tough watch, but incredibly interesting and thought-provoking. The series follows two Forensic Research Chemists, Sonya Farak and Annie Dookhan, that are focused primarily on drug testing and identification within a government-controlled laboratory. Throughout the Documentary, you are introduced to both Chemists and are told of the ways in which their criminal actions impacted the cases and lives of thousands of individuals.
Sonya Farak began her career as a Research Chemist after finding love with a friend and following her to a new town. After the relationship dissolved, she continued with her new career, eventually transferring to a lab in Amherst, Massachusetts. What no one realized during her 14-year career was that she was, in fact, a drug addict herself. With uninhibited access to Government Standards of substances like Cocaine, Methamphetamine, and LSD, she was able to feed her drug habit daily for years – going as far as to use drugs like LSD while in the Lab testing the drugs that would be used in criminal convictions.
All of this spiraled out of control for her when she was found to be using drugs at work, and not only stealing Government Standards but also evidence that was being brought in to her for testing. She constantly stole Cocaine from the evidence that was sent to her, eventually moving to make her own Crack from the evidence. She was actually making Crack from confiscated Cocaine in the Laboratory that she was working in. In. The. Lab! She was finally caught when investigators found out how incredibly blatant her actions actually were. They found not only open and used Cocaine and Crack evidence, but also an actual Crack Pipe that she had made with lab equipment to smoke at work. The whole saga of Sonya is unbelievable and ultimately leads to a harsh reality that the people she helped put in prison for years, may have in fact not had the types or amounts of drugs that Sonya was reporting. Resulting in multiple convictions of decade-long sentences – including one criminal who was picked up for Cocaine, and Sonya reported that it was in fact Heroin. This result was from the day that she was testing Cocaine samples in the lab, on a day that she had taken LSD at work in the lab, and was completely incoherent when performing the tests on the Cocaine samples, that all came up positive for Heroin. Truly heartbreaking to watch. The results of her years of bad testing and drug use at work led to the dismissal of nearly 24,000 convictions from around 16,000 different cases.
The other Chemist profiled in the series is Annie Dookhan. While the Documentary focuses much on the aspects of drug addiction when discussing Sonya Farak, the case against Annie Dookhan is much more sinister. The allegations against here had much wider-ranging and much more devastating impacts. It was estimated that her criminal actions affected up to 21,000 criminal cases that ended up being dismissed.
She was found to be working in close relations with Criminal Prosecutors, often promising results for substances that they would send in. She would often say over email that she would work as hard as she could to get the results that they were looking for. It’s chilling to watch as they go into many of the worst cases she affected, including many that had devastating criminal consequences for potentially innocent people. She also used her position to try to get dates with Prosecutors on numerous occasions. Included in this storyline is one of the strangest actions by Dookhan overall. She posed as other people to try to convince Prosecutors to give her a chance to be in a relationship. It’s extremely bizarre and pretty uncomfortable to watch because Dookhan seems unfazed by all of these actions and allegations.
This is an important watch because it goes to prove that without solid researchers, the accused in America are exposed to another form of injustice. The entire series you’ll be asking, ‘How does this possibly happen?’ By the end, you’ll be terrified to think of how easily these problems could come to exist, and that they may in fact already be happening all over the United States.
White Sturgeon are native to the West coast of North America, where they may be found in coastal waters from Mexico to Alaska. Although occasionally found in the ocean, they primarily reside in large rivers and their associated estuaries, including the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta in California. White Sturgeon are the largest freshwater fish in North America. There are historical records of fish as large as 18 ft, although it is now rare to encounter fish larger than 6.5 ft in Californian waters. The average White Sturgeon captured in the Delta in recent years is approximately 109 cm or roughly under 4 feet. White Sturgeon are long-lived. According to California Fish and Wildlife, the oldest fish on record was 103 years old at the time of capture, but most fish in the Delta are now believed to be less than 20 years old. Males may spawn every two years, whereas females spawn every 2-4 years. Adults migrate from the estuary into the river in winter, spawn from February to June, and return to the Delta after spawning. The primary spawning habitat of Sacramento-San Joaquin White Sturgeon is a short reach of the middle Sacramento River, making it vulnerable to climate change or habitat loss. Other factors that threaten White Sturgeon include contaminants from pollution and runoff and poaching and illegal fishing for meat and eggs. The California White Sturgeon is not listed on any state or federal list but is considered a species of concern. Due to where the fish is categorized, there are steep fishing regulations compared to other local species. The daily bag limit for White sturgeon is one per an angler a day, 3 per year. The fish must be between 40-60 inches fork length to keep. Any sturgeon over 68in fork length may not be removed from the water or it would be prosecuted for a criminal act. When it comes to catching these beasts, the bait must be specific. Ghost and grass shrimp are usually considered best, but sturgeon will also bite on shad minnows and crayfish. For tackle, A medium to a heavyweight rod with a sensitive tip and conventional baitcasting reel is probably most common, though many people use spinning reels. Use a 30 to 50-pound test line with wire leaders and single or double hooks and sliding sinker setup. They strike hard! When it comes to where and when, the best season to fish for them is usually from the beginning of winter when the water starts to get muddy and looks like chocolate syrup, until early summer. When fishing on the Sacramento delta side, areas like Decker Islands entrance to Three miles Slough, off the old dairy farm, Rio Vista, Knights Landing, and the deep-water channel are all places you can frequently find sturgeon. San Pablo, Suisun Bays, and the Mothball Fleet are prime areas where the water turns brackish. When it comes to a specific location, I’ve had the best luck in water from 14 to 80 feet deep, usually deep holes are best. Always remember when fishing for White Sturgeon, barbless hooks are always mandatory.
Considered the delta’s most well-known sport fish, the Stripper is known for its hard fights and tasty meat. Originally introduced to the west coast in the late 1800s, the Striped bass has since flourished in the California Delta ecosystem. By the early 1900s, the striped bass was being caught in sufficient numbers that a commercial fishery began. The commercial fishery was later determined to be detrimental to the maintenance of a strong recreational sport fishery and 30 years later Striped Bass were classified as game fish ending all commercial fishing. Most Pacific stripers spend summers feeding on anchovies in the ocean along the Pacific Coast. Many wander along the coast from California to Oregon until spring when spawning brings them back to the delta and surrounding waterways. Along the California Coast, most stripers re-enter the San Francisco Bay in fall and winter and locations throughout the Bay and delta system. In spring the stripers head up the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers to spawn. They travel as much as 124 miles upstream in the Sacramento River and reach into the Feather River. In the California delta region, the water is majority brackish where the river and bay waters mix. Striped bass lingers there, adjusting to the difference in salinity before they transit up the rivers to spawn, and again when they return to the Bay. Due to Strippers being considered an invasive species, the introduction has been controversial due to the destruction of Delta Smelt and Salmon reproduction. When it comes to fishing for them, similar to sturgeon, Striped Bass enjoy smelly live fish like Anchovies, threadfin shad, and sardines. Other baits like bloodworms, grass and ghost shrimp, mudsuckers, sculpins, and crayfish are commonly used. When attaching the bait to the hook, use nylon thread (magic thread) to secure it to the hook. This decreases the chance of throwing off your bait during casting or smaller fish from eating it off of your hook. Anglers also use plastic tackle like 3 to 7-inch Rebels and Rapalas. The line should be moderately medium to heavy, anywhere from 10-30lbs test. The spring spawning run up the Sacramento and San Joaquin Rivers is probably the best season in the Delta, but the fall run is also a heavy producer of huge sized fish. The fall and spring run almost seem to collide, creating good fishing from September to June, and resident stripers are caught during the summer. Anywhere around the Delta, you can find Striped Bass located. Specific areas like the deep-water channel, Knights Landing and Rio Vista are all hot locations throughout the fishing year. Back sloughs located around Stockton and highway 12 are always money spots as well. The daily bag limit is 2 per day in possession with fish having to exceed 18inches.
The Chinook Salmon, also known as King Salmon, is the largest species of pacific salmon. 
The California Delta is known for its Catfish. Nearly any slough or river system holds vast quantities of these fish. Due to the vast quantity of them, Catfish don’t have a daily bag limit or size limit. So, you can keep all fish you may bag, anytime in the year. Summer is the peak season for catfish in the region. Preparation is vital to success so have a 15-20-pound test line with sliding weights, anywhere from 2-4oz to combat the current. As far as bait goes, there’s a long list of things that work, but they may also attract other fish as well, like striped bass. The best baits for catfish include anchovies, bloodworms, chicken liver, clams, dough baits, nightcrawlers, sardines, stink baits, and turkey livers. The best areas to look for catfish vary in depth from 3 to twenty feet with the deeper waters more productive in the winter. Some example areas include 3mile Slough, 7mile Slough, Middle River, Miner Sloughs, Old River, and Sherman Lake. The best strategy is to try a spot for around 30 minutes and then move on to another nearby area. If you find that your bait keeps falling off or smaller fish have removed it from the hook repeatedly, use nylon magic thread to secure the bait to hook. Fishing for any of the 3 catfish species is very relaxing. Kick back in a lounge chair and have a beer. This is bait fishing, its slow but the upside is HUGE!
For our last fish, I chose the Delta Smelt. The Delta Smelt is an endangered slender-bo
sweating, then it is too hot and you need to take the blanket off. Blankets are essential for horses that are thin, sick, recently clipped or been moved to a colder climate would have trouble staying warm. Remember that when blanketing a horse for long periods of time, the horse’s body will get used to it and not produce enough hair it needs to stay warm without a blanket. A lot of other horse owners prefer not to blanket their horses so that they will produce their own warmth and will then be prepared for other weather to come along.
Jocelyn Catterson grew up in a small town in the mountains of Colorado. Her childhood was full of barefoot wandering, fort building, mudpie making, and camping. These days, she loves to collect edible plants, backpack with her husband and two dogs, and nurture her childlike curiosity of the natural world.
The show that my employer hosted a couple weeks ago was specifically for travel. It was hosted in the ballroom of a hotel so space was a little limited. We had all the major travel vendors in attendance, i.e., Royal Caribbean, Viking, Trafalgar, etc, about twenty five in all. Everyone had a nice big table with electricity so they could have slideshows, music, or lights, but the vendor couldn’t put up any awnings or things hanging from the ceiling. The tables were 8 feet long by 2.5 feet wide. The vendor could pretty much decorate or display however they wanted as long as it didn’t interfere with the trade show traffic or other vendors. All the travel vendors had the same size space. Also, during our travel show we had a separate area where the various travel vendors were giving presentations and having question and answer sessions.
The trade show hosted by the chamber is held in a much bigger space but had a lot more rules. Businesses can choose what kind of booth they want. An organization could choose between a “standard” or “premium” booth. The standard booth included one standard size table, 2 chairs, 1 6×3 foot sign placed next to the table, no electricity and no wifi. 
At my employers travel trade show we had most of a whole floor at a hotel. There was a specific room where the travel vendors set up their tables and then 
How does the booth look? Take a step back and look at it from the attendees point of view, it should be warm and inviting yet also unique. First impressions are everything! Attendees should be able to see your booth from afar and it should be memorable. There will probably be hundreds of booths and yours needs to stand out. During the show don’t forget to keep the booth well-kept. Make sure that any stock stays maintained, that everything looks neat and tidy and that there isn’t any trash anywhere. Make sure to have some cool promotional items and giveaways. These can be small items that will help attendees remember who you are. And also advertise for you! I thought this article had some good ideas for trade show merch, something other than paper fans and ink pens, 
I think that one thing that goes unmentioned a lot of the time are the people who are manning the booth. The people in the booth should be personable and friendly, they should be able to speak to other people and not stand around with their arms crossed. Your team members should make sure to make eye contact and speak with visitors. Be courteous and polite and thank them for visiting. Yes, getting a good night’s sleep is very important. It is also important to stay hydrated and away from the alcohol. Many trade shows give out drink tickets but I think it’s a good idea for employees to stay away from those. Yes, our team members should have fun at a trade show but they are also there to work. I’ve seen too many people take advantage of those free drinks and make a fool not only of themselves but also of their company and that is a huge liability. Will your team have a dress code? Many companies nowadays have branded apparel. It’s a cheap and easy way to market your company and also look professional. This is the case with my company, any event we attend we must wear branded apparel. Remember your team is the face of your organization. I found the following article about trade show booth etiquette to be really informative and helpful 