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catfoodblogs-blog · 4 years ago

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cat food wet

he time does fly. It seems only Cat Food a short time ago that I was sitting at the same desk writing an article for the 50th anniversary issue of this magazine. Now the 60th anniversary has arrived. Ten years ago, I presented an overview of 50 years of the magazine. Although a lot has happened with the magazine over the past 10 years, it felt best to take a different tack this time around. So to this end, I am presenting a combination of two of my favorite topics: catfishes and their aquarium feeding.

The feeding of aquarium catfishes, or all fishes for that matter, has in many ways changed immensely since this magazine first debuted in late 1952. Commercial fish food formulas have gone through a lot of improvement, and these have benefited both keeper and pet. But what goes around also comes around, and many hobbyists are rediscovering some of the good parts of fish feeding from the 1950s and forward (more live foods, custom-blended homemade fish foods, etc.). This is not to say that many, if not most, of the—how shall I put this—more mature fishkeepers ever stopped their "older" ways. They continued along with these and have adopted (and adapted to) some of the newer aspects of the feeding of their charges.

Plecos and Other Veggie-Eating Catfish

For quite a few years, loricariids have been at the zenith of their popularity, and it only seems to keep peaking. For many years (decades, actually), they were basically the clean-up crew and were seemingly tolerated because of their algae-eating habits. Their detritus-eating character (utilizing for food much of that gunk [mulm] that can accumulate on the bottom of a tank that receives less than favorable maintenance) was also appreciated. But there was always a small group of aquarists who appreciated them more for what they were than for what they did.

Times have changed; loricariids are now one of the hottest groups of catfishes going and are appreciated by both dedicated catfish fans and general aquarists alike. Gee, do you think that the zebra pleco (Hypancistrus zebra) and the constantly growing list of similarly beautiful catfishes have had something to do with this?

A Varied Palate

First it must be noted that not all loricariids are primarily vegetal-feeding catfishes. The aforementioned H. zebra has shown itself, in the wild and captivity, to have a predilection for meatier foods. Although algae and detritus are eaten in the wild, this species also feeds on bryozoans (moss animals), non-shrimp crustaceans, and insect larvae (bloodworms).

Other loricariids also show a more carnivorous diet: Scobinancistrus spp., at least in the minimal literature available, are apparently totally carnivorous, although their main prey (bivalve mollusks and possibly snails) would provide some green material that they had ingested to the nutritional profile of these species.

Loricaria spp. Diet

Other loricariids, such as some Loricaria spp. and some other genera will, at least seasonally (or based on food in the environment), also feed heavily on meaty foods, such as various insect larvae, mollusks, and sponges. This situation needs to be kept in mind and researched when you might be considering picking up a new species from this large family of catfishes.

Commercial Diets

Loricariids adapt very well to commercial captive diets overall, and generally these should consist of foods with a higher percentage of vegetal material. Such foods also provide animal-based material to round out the nutritional profile. Most commercial foods tend to utilize Spirulina as their primary vegetal base. This is actually a cyanobacteria, but that is a tale for another time. Nonetheless, it is a wonderfully healthy food source for both fish and man. Although the name Spirulina is generally used, the most commonly farmed species belong to the genus Arthrospira. But the name Spirulina persists in general use and will probably do so for some time to come. There is also some increased use of Chlorella algae (a single-celled microalgae), which is a promising development.

Additionally, some formulas are utilizing various vegetables that you might expect to find at your dinner table. At least a couple of such foods are noted to contain (in addition to Spirulina) the following ingredients: carrots, celery, beets, parsley, lettuce, and spinach. Wow! Sounds like my supper. Of course, these foods have many additional elements, including vitamins and minerals, to round out their nutritional profile. Many of these commercial foods will be found in various formats—flakes, discs, sticks—so you can choose whichever fits the needs of your particular catfishes.

Algae

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But, in using the above items, don't overlook the use of the real things. The first to be considered is algae. As noted above, algae is a major food item for many loricariids. Providing living algae for these catfishes is a goal to strive for; it gives the fish a more natural experience in that they can graze the food as they would normally do in the wild. But as anyone who has kept even a single bushy nose pleco(Ancistrus spp.) can attest, these fishes are very determined. Little natural algae growing in the tank will remain.

The Feeding Platform Method

The best way to remedy this is to grow algae elsewhere and move it into the tank containing target species. This can be done by the feeding platform method. You take a suitable platform (a rock, piece of driftwood, flowerpot, etc.) and, in the absence of any fishes that will feed on algae, let it develop some nice green growth. This platform can then be moved to a tank containing your loricariid(s), and they will be supplied with a living green treat. Such platforms can be moved from other aquaria that might be growing algae. Such a tank could even be set up for this specific purpose, with numerous platforms that can be used on a rotating basis. But be sure that there are no health problems with any contained fishes that might potentially be transported along with them.

Outdoor Algae Growth

This can also be done outside (at least for warmer times of the year in more northern latitudes). I use Styrofoam fish boxes filled with multiple platforms making sure that they get full sun. Although algae will just grow there, I usually inoculate such containers with an initial algae dose from a tank, or tanks, in the fishroom. Such a set up of two or three boxes can provide a large amount of living algae as food. I will note my wife, Aline, was less than amused with such use of our patio, but she finally warmed up to it. Should you want to be specific with your algae type (e.g., Chlorella), you can purchase starter culture units, although these will end up having to compete with Mother Nature's choice of greens.

Vegetables

The feeding of real vegetables, as noted in some commercial foods above, is a tried-and-true method of providing green food to loricariids, and many other catfishes for that matter. There are numerous veggies that make an excellent and appreciated food source. This is an area wherein you can experiment to find your catfishes’ tastes.

Zucchini

A good place to start is with zucchini (or other squashes). These can be washed and then sliced (long- or cross-way, your choice) and offered to the fish. There are varying opinions as to whether such food should be served raw or lightly cooked (for about a minute or so in boiling water). I prefer the cooked method. First, such produce sinks easily and doesn't have to be tied down. Second, research has shown that lightly cooking zucchini makes more nutrients available by starting the breakdown of cellular walls. Note: With zucchini, make sure that your catfishes eat the skin—this is where the majority of the vitamin A is located. Sometimes this takes a bit of training because the softer middle will often be eaten and then the fish moves on. If you leave the skins in the tank and hold off on other foods a bit, they will take to it. Also, if you use across-cut rounds, slice the skin in one place so that you are not left with a skin ring. These can be a problem, and I have seen loricariids become entangled in them and die.

Other Veggies

From zucchini, let your imagination run wild and try a variety of veggies. The FDA publishes nutritional charts for vegetables, and these can be a good guide to help you choose a good mix. Among others, I really like canned (or frozen) green beans. I most often have used French-cut style as a constantly present food for baby loricariids. The French style is good in that it exposes large areas of the softer pulp on which the young fishes initially feed.

Whichever way you go with veggies, and if you do your own light cooking, you can take the end product, freeze it on cookie sheets, and then store it in the freezer in air-tight containers. Then you just take out what you need and add to the tank(s).

Meaty Supplements

As a last thought, it should be noted that even the most algae eating of grazing loricariids do regularly ingest smaller quantities of meaty foods as part of the process. This may include insect larvae, small crustaceans, etc. So in addition to regular commercial-style foods, algae, and vegetables, do, in small quantities, regularly add foods such as frozen or freeze-dried brine shrimp, bloodworms, small krill, etc. for that extra flavor and nutritional punch. You can offer it right alongside the other foods or as a separate treat.

Other Herbivorous Cats

Three genera of the African catfish family Mochokidae (Atopochilus, Euchilichthys, and Atopodontis—the latter has never been imported, as far as I know) mentioned are basically ecological equivalents of many of the loricariids and enjoy a similar diet. Even visually there is at least enough of a resemblance that sometimes they have been sold as "African plecos," a name that I distinctly dislike, but that is another story for another time.

Predatory Catfishes

There are many aquarium-popular catfishes that are generally considered as a fish-eating group, but it can be taken beyond this in general principle. This diet grouping is not necessarily correct, as other foods such as shrimp, crabs, mollusks, etc. may also be eaten depending on the environment and/or time of the year. Many such predatory catfishes are also known to eat various fruits, again depending on the seasonal availability. The South American redtail catfish (Phractocephalus hemioliopterus) is such an animal, and its diet of such items has been well documented. Such work has also shown them to pass the seeds of such fruits, which then germinate and grow under proper conditions.

Vegetal Material

Even catfishes that may not specifically eat fruits do often ingest vegetal material in other ways. One way is that when prey items are digested, the contents of their gut then become food for the fish that ate them. At least some of the various prey fishes for a wide variety of predators are known to be vegetarians or detritus eaters. Detritus is broken-down vegetal material, generally with a good complement of micro and macro invertebrates. It has also been noted that predatory fishes may secondarily ingest some vegetal material when they are chasing and capturing their prey. This is no doubt true, but in some cases there may be more to the situation.

Meat

A case in point to the last situation is one of my favorite smaller (max size around 10 inches TL) predatory catfish, the auchenipterid Ageneiosus magoi. Two diet studies on this species do show it to be primarily a meat eater with fishes, frogs (in breeding season), shrimp, and insect larvae making up the bulk of its diet. But these two studies did show vegetal material (plants and detritus) present at respective values of 1) approximately 1.4 percent by weight and 2) 8.6 percent by occurrence. These figures don't, and really couldn't, show the additional vegetal percent comprised by the gut contents of their prey.

In any case, I was walking around the fish room one day, passing out small pieces of lightly boiled zucchini to a variety of tanks. As I went by the Ageneiosus tank, which contained six individuals around 5 to 6 inches long, I said “what the heck” and tossed in a couple of pieces. These were gobbled up as fast as something more meaty (bloodworms, guppies) would have been. More was added, more was eaten—and I know that the fish were not nutritionally deprived. The vegetal food then became, in small amounts, a regular part of their diet. Does this one example prove something? I think that it does, and it makes a point worth pondering and worthy of more experimentation with other catfishes.

Feeding Your Predatory Catfish

So for any predatory catfishes that you might keep, do work on getting some vegetal material into their diet. Direct feeding of vegetables or fruits is ideal if possible, but if not, do feed them prepared foods (at least in part) with a good algal/vegetable formula. If you are a live-fish feeder, do use healthy fish and make sure to gutload them with a similar food before introducing them to the predator's tank.

Omnivores

Another group of predatory catfishes to be considered are the insectivore/mixed carnivore type. Actually, many of these might be more properly classified, for aquarium feeding purposes, as omnivores. This basically means that they take good amounts of meaty and vegetal foods. This includes many smaller and medium-sized catfishes that make their living by feeding primarily on insect larvae and pupae. Such a diet may also include terrestrial insects that unluckily fall into the water and other small meaty foods such as crustaceans, mollusks, etc.

Looking for Food

Many of such catfishes may be deemed speculators in that they swim around “looking” for (by vision and tactile methods) and selectively take in promising foods. Such catfishes include many smaller pimelodids, doradids, and Corydoras and Synodontis species. This, as with the larger catfishes noted above, is often accompanied with the ingestion of some plant material (higher plants and/or detritus). This can often, at least seasonally, make up a pretty good part of the diet.

Variety

And their prey items are often life forms that make their living feeding on vegetation-sourced foods. Again, this is another good, and necessary, reason to make sure that this group of catfishes gets some green foods added to their diet. Many of these will take small amounts of regular vegetables but will do equally well on some of the available prepared foods (flakes, discs, sticks) that have a decent vegetal content. Just remember, pleco foods aren't just for plecos! They are an excellent addition to the diet of any catfish that will eat them—and that includes just about all of them.

These catfishes also appreciate live foods as part of their diet, and these can often be gutloaded with a number of vegetal-based foods. An outstanding guide to managing this feeding situation is the book Culturing Live Foods by Michael R. Hellweg (T.F.H. Publications, 2008). All aquarists should seriously consider having this book in their aquatic library.

Additional Considerations

As a final note, there are some topics that must be passed on, such as an initially planned discussion on the growing use of duckweed as an important fish food. But that’s for another time, and we will take it from there. Think green, feed green, and eat green.

See the full article on TFH Digital http://www.tfhdigital.com/tfh/201209#pg63

Zebra Pleco (Hypancistrus zebra) Species | Tropical Fish Hobbyist Magazine

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pass-the-bechdel · 6 years ago

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Marvel Cinematic Universe: Doctor Strange (2016)

Does it pass the Bechdel Test?

No.

How many female characters (with names and lines) are there?

Two (16.66% of cast).

How many male characters (with names and lines) are there?

Ten.

Positive Content Rating:

Three.

General Film Quality:

A mediocre story that mostly relies on its special effects in order to appear interesting.

MORE INFO (and potential spoilers) UNDER THE CUT:

Passing the Bechdel:

The only time that Christine and The Ancient One share the screen is when the latter is unconscious and dying, so the failure here is particularly unsurprising. For that matter, you could even argue that ‘The Ancient One’ isn’t much of a name for a named character to have...

Female characters:

The Ancient One.

Christine Palmer.

Male characters:

Kaecilius.

Stephen Strange.

Billy.

Nicodemus West.

Etienne.

Jonathan Pangborn.

Mordo.

Wong.

Daniel Drumm.

Dormammu.

OTHER NOTES:

Kaecilius produces two blades simultaneously for the beheading of the librarian, but the head is removed in a single slice, which means that one of those blades was being waved around purely for the Cool Points of dual-wielding. All about that aesthetic.

Someone sure did enjoy Inception, huh?

Remember that thing about how Iron Man balanced Tony Stark’s initial self-absorbed asshole behaviour really well with his journey to heroism in order to make him palatable enough to watch in the first place? Strange categorically does not get that treatment. He’s just an egotistical jerk who is tedious to watch, and while his arrogance is variously addressed by other characters, him going through an emotionally redemptive process is presumed by the script rather than actually being included.

If they really, really wanted Benedict Cumberbatch for this role, I feel like they should have just allowed him to be a British doctor living and working in the States. The guy cannot do accents.

My sister saw them filming the scenes in the streets of Kathmandu. Small world.

I understand that The Ancient One was an Asian man in the comics, and while I applaud the decision to make the character female in this film (especially considering that the only other significant female character is the awkwardly-included personality-lite love interest Christine), they shoulda done it without the white-washing. Tilda Swinton is great, though.

...Mister Doctor.

in an altogether lacklustre film, The Ancient One’s final moments are a highlight.

Also a highlight: the reverse destruction in Hong Kong, a much better use of the bountiful reliance on special effects in this movie, where so much of it previously had been empty spectacle.

So, let’s talk a bit about that well-known writing rule: Show, Don’t Tell.

While this movie certainly does a lot of showing in the showy sense of the word - the frequently-empty spectacle of special effects as mentioned above - that’s not the type of show from whence story comes, and it leaves the thin plot to be almost exclusively told, without active support in the content of the film. Having characters charge around in the mirror universe doing weird spatial warping shit may be visually entertaining enough to hold the audience’s interest (at least the first time around), but it doesn’t help us to comprehend any aspect of the plot, its rules, what drives it, what matters, etc. It’s just...empty spectacle. Doctor Strange doesn’t pretend to be complex or deep storytelling outside of that anyway, and that’s ok insofar as there’s no reason it has to be or even should be, but what it is, when you set that spectacle aside, is...kinda nothing?

The game of ‘recount the plot as simplistically as possible’ goes like so: arrogant doctor suffers a seemingly incurable injury, searches for a cure anyway, finds a temple of the mystical arts, learns some mystical arts, fights some rival magicians, thwarts their evil plot, the end. As I’ve noted before, the ability to distill a plot to its simplest form is not in itself proof that the plot is somehow bad or lacking; the question is what does the actual film do to make that simplistic plot work for it? When the answer is ‘...kinda nothing?’, that’s a bad sign, and particularly unfortunate here because the whole mystical arts and magicians and the freakin’ multiverse thing has no excuse for being this boring. As a simplified plot, Doctor Strange still sounds like it could be intriguing, it’s brimming with potential, and yet the only thing it exploits that potential for is an excuse to over-indulge in special effects. It’s a waste of story ideas, to start with, and considering the cast, a waste of actors, too. If you’re not gonna make the most of their skills, you might as well cast a horde of unknowns and save the casting portion of the budget for, I dunno, another gravity-defying skyscraper battle?

It should come as no shock at this point that I’m about to make this about the greatest resource of any story: the characters, both because that’s what I always do, and because damn, did they forget about characterisation being, y’know, a thing you actually have to write into the script? You can cast the greatest actors in the world if you want, and they’ll do their best to make a symphony out of the single note you give them to work with, but even then all they can do is make thin material look its best; they can’t magically generate story action and development in the places where their characterisation should have been. Let’s talk about Kaecilius as an example, because as the plot’s antagonist, he’s the most egregious of the lot: why is Kaecilius the villain? The part where he’s positioned opposite the protagonist characters and their ethos is an indicator, yeah, but why is he there, doing what he’s doing, what are his motivations? The basic answer is that he wants to bring Dormammu and the power of the dark dimension to Earth because he thinks it will bring peace and life everlasting. How do we know he wants that? We’re told so in the dialogue. Why does Kaecilius think this is a good idea? Don’t know. Turns out Dormammu’s bad news, but we don’t know how or why Kaecilius was misled on the subject. Power from the dark dimension is apparently bad news too - we know because we are told so in the dialogue - but why exactly this is and what the consequences are is unclear. We don’t have the information we need in order to understand why Kaecilius turned so severely, why certain rules exist or why they are being broken; everything we know, we know because it’s delivered to us in plain speech, not because we see it demonstrated in the events of the film, and considering that the core of the conflict seems to have come from distrust in The Ancient One’s teachings, it’s pretty ironic that the narrative then expects the audience to know or believe the truth in anything that she or her acolytes utters. If we were shown the truth of it, or at least shown the reasons to doubt or contemplate alternatives, we might be able to build a story out of this, but instead, we get ‘fuck you, it’s like this coz we said so. He has metallic purple eyeliner, isn’t that enough?’

This lack of character building spills out to impact the rest of the characters too, naturally; the criminally-underused Mordo suffers especially as a result, since everything from his reason for coming to Kamar Taj, to his supposed rigid outlook on life, to his disillusionment with the cause, all relies on the audience simply shrugging off the idea of being shown the evidence in behaviour, the influence of the past, how it shapes his perspective in the present, etc, just forgoing anything that could be considered characterisation (and therefore, fodder for character development), and settle for ‘he’s like this: we know because another character said so’. Functionally, Mordo is hardly a character at all, he’s just The Other Guy that Strange sometimes interacts with, and big revelatory moments for him - Strange outing The Ancient One’s use of dark dimension power, Mordo grappling with his shaken faith - fall flat because we haven’t seen why this should matter, why Mordo can’t bring himself to see shades of grey in a situation, why The Ancient One has kept these secrets in the first place etc. The Ancient One herself fairs only marginally better as a character because the only thing we know about her (mostly because we’re told) is that she’s secretive; that said, ‘she’s secretive’ doesn’t work all that well as a sneaky way to avoid actually fleshing out a character, and the fact that instead of having any more meaningful secret revealed other than her power usage (which, again, isn’t that meaningful really because we aren’t shown a genuine reason to attribute it meaning, we just know that the characters are saying upset words about it), The Ancient One simply dies without ever becoming less enigmatic, means that we’re still left with more of a shell of a character than a real one, just the concept of a person, not an actual person with motivations and decisions we are privy to or could understand (and therefore, could judge or attribute meaning).

Strange, at least, is shown to be an arrogant jackass, but, as noted, that personality template is presented in a very cliche manner that - in the context of the MCU - reads much like a Tony Stark knock-off, only without any of the character nuance or developmental arc to pull it off in a palatable or entertaining fashion, and part of that problem is the fact that while Strange’s initial personality is shown, his process of change is...not. Like anything else in the film that should have been dynamic, it’s told to us in words more that it is demonstrated in actions. The earlier portion of the film is somewhat slow and low on intrigue or tension due to the fact that Strange doesn’t know the extent of the world he has become involved with, and he’s wholly occupied with his quest for a cure (though, frustration with his progress or with the fact that none of his training seems relevant to it is pretty light-on, as are any moments of struggle with his own self-interest vs the greater good - Strange’s hands are just a means to an end so that he has a reason to find Kamar Taj, rather than a sustained part of his struggles on a physical, mental, or emotional level). As soon as Strange learns that there’s a bigger battle out there, Kaecilius attacks (very convenient timing), and the story changes gears to launch headlong into its final act, with only time for The Ancient One to tell Strange that this is not about him (though, again, his self-interest has not remained centralised enough nor created continued strife necessary to make this declaration seem revelatory) before Strange is faced with either playing the game, or letting Kaecilius bring Dormammu and end the world. As such, Strange deciding that endless dark dimension torment is a bad thing isn’t really a big forward step (or even a selfless one - he could still be 100% focused on returning to his old life and leaving the multiverse to the pros, he just obviously can’t achieve his own self-interest with Dormammu around). Technically, we never see proof that Strange has given up his old ways, bettered himself as a person, or made any kind of decision that isn’t about his own ego (sticking around to become a universe-saving time-lord sorcerer is, um, a distinct step up the power trip ladder, after all). The idea that this character has actually gone through anything more than a career shift is just kinda assumed, rather than being demonstrated, and consequently, the idea that this is a character worth rooting for now is also, just assumed.

Ultimately, the moral of the story is pretty obvious - ‘show, don’t tell’ doesn’t have to mean ‘never provide exposition to explain anything’, but it does mean that you should try to demonstrate essential things like worldbuilding and characterisation as often as possible, if for no other reason than because letting your audience see that something is so is much more engaging and powerful than just telling them how it is. If all you’re gonna do is tell, you might as well just stick with reciting the plot aloud, it’d be cheaper and less time-consuming, and while it wouldn’t really take advantage of the fact that film is a visual medium, just churning out a bunch of special effects shenanigans without a plot to underpin them doesn’t take as much advantage of that as you might think, either. Imagine what an interesting, dark, twisty film we could have made out of this story if, say, questioning The Ancient One’s teachings (or cleaving to them unflinchingly) had been made a prominent concept, so that rifts in trust and the shaking of core beliefs about the universe were more meaningful developments? Imagine if Dormammu was a more significant idea about which we heard conflicting information from unreliable sources, imagine if we could see how tantalising Kaecilius’ perspective was, if Strange struggled at all with who to believe and how to reconcile his ego with the smallness of his existence in the vast multiverse, etc, etc. Imagine if the plot had some sort of core concept instead of just empty spectacle and placeholder characters. Imagine. What a waste.

#Marvel Cinematic Universe #Doctor Strange #MCU #Bechdel Test #female representation

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broadwaybydesign · 8 years ago

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Nothing In Our Way: Costuming “Allegiance”

It seems like every time I get an Ask, the musical finds its way to the top of my queue of shows to review. That’s fine by me! Today, I’m going to take a look at some of the costumes from the Broadway musical Allegiance, which had a short run on Broadway but lives on in the cultural conscience thanks to two cinematic productions. The costumes are rich and varied, and I think that looking at them offers a nice complement and contrast to the Bandstand costumes I reviewed early on in this blog’s existence.

First, a little bit of background. Allegiance is a musical that attempts to illuminate a tragic chapter of American history through the beauty of the stage musical. Based on the memories and life of actor and internet hero George Takei, it focuses on the experiences of Japanese-Americans who were interned during the Second World War, detained without charge or reason simply because of their Japanese ancestry. Some were Japanese immigrants to the United States, but many, like Mr. Takei, were born and raised right here in the U.S. Their story is tragic, but there is a kind of optimism that infuses the musical: the goal is not merely to inform the public about the terribleness of the internment camps, but to enable a dialogue and a reconciliation regarding one of the saddest chapters in our history. I really do recommend that you check it out if you haven’t had a chance; the music and lyrics are memorable and powerful in 1940s style, and the passion the cast has for their roles is blindingly apparent.

Allegiance is also the first major musical on Broadway to feature a predominantly Asian cast without resorting to tropes and stereotypes. Chief amongst their cast is powerhouse Lea Salonga, who was the first-ever Asian woman to win a Tony Award for acting and is a groundbreaker in so many ways. Mr Takei himself also takes the stage as the man whose memories inform the plot, and the supporting cast is skilled beyond measure.

The costumes themselves are fascinating, and the main thrust of today’s review and discussion now that I’ve offered a little bit of an entrée into the musical itself. Costume designer Alejo Vietti, best known for his work on Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, created some gorgeous pieces that absolutely fit the 1940s aesthetic of the musical. Rarely for me, I’m going to offer some commentary on both the women’s and men’s costumes this time around because I think they deserve to be considered together. Let’s take a look:

This still offers us a good starting point for looking at Mr Vietti’s costume design. Ms Salonga’s character, Kei Kimura, is seen speaking with her grandfather in this scene, played by Mr Takei. Her dress is vibrant and patterned with a kind of geometric design, with some additional detail work along the collar of the dress itself. When I look at the dress, the first thing that sticks out is that it’s functional rather than designed to be “sexy” or enhance attractiveness. That’s a hallmark of early 1940s and wartime design. Aside from couture, fashion for the masses was designed to be usable and without much in the way of adornment, allowing whatever pattern was chosen for the fabric to do much of the work. What I like about this dress is that the green-over-red feels a bit symbolic to me. I look at the pattern and I see blades of grass that have been cut down and are drifting in the wind, all over a dramatic red background. That feels to me like a good metaphor for internment itself: these people were uprooted and scattered amidst a background of war and fear. I’m not 100% sure that was Mr Vietti’s intent, but it’s one that I think can be easily read-in.

Contrast that with Mr Takei’s costume in this scene. While costuming men is often a more simple affair, here the sweater offers a stoic and staid look. This is an older gentleman, confounded by the conditions in which he has been placed, but not modifying his outlook in the slightest. The sweater is a simple design, with a gray-blue plaid, blue sleeves, and a blue hem. It’s dark to fit the tone of the musical, but also shows a pride of appearance for the character himself. In contrast to Kei, Ojii-Chan (George Takei) is somber and more conservative, a relic of another generation. The costuming choice made by Mr Vietti accounts for that, and it’s a nice touch.

Part of the theme of the trauma of internment comes from the fact that these were everyday Americans uprooted under spurious pretenses, but who complied because they were told to by a government they still felt some measure of loyalty to. That comes out in some of the costume choices that concern the move towards the internment camps themselves:

Mr Vietti has gone the historically accurate route here. When Japanese-Americans were interned, they treated it with dignity that, frankly, I doubt most Americans could muster today. They put on their traveling clothes, as seen here, and complied peacefully; they may not have had the choice, but the compliance and willingness to trust this was a temporary horror is one of the things that I think makes their story one of true bravery. Here, we see the Kimura family on their way to internment and they’re dressed as...if they were going on a family vacation. Ms Salonga’s dress and coat are immaculate in a beautiful shade of brown (for the coat) and purple (for the underlying dress). Mr Takei (sporting the tag that internment victims were required to have on their clothing during the transit process) is in muted shades again, this time with a more functional jacket than the sweater in the previous still. Telly Leung (as Sam Kimura) is dressed as your average young man in the 1940s would be dressed, right down to the athletic, letterman-style jacket in shades of blue and gray.

I haven’t talked much about color palates on the blog, but I’ll throw a quick comment out here. Ms Salonga has the softest palate, with complementary colors that come together to make for a visually appealing look. Mr Takei is a much more stark palate, with grays and blacks predominating to add to the feeling of betrayal and bewilderment that his character no doubt feels at this moment. Mr Leung’s wardrobe, on the other hand, mixes the two previous palates: the beautiful blue contrasts with the starkness of the gray, giving some sense of mixed feelings and mixed emotions from the character--and that’s definitely an interesting thing to behold.

This is not a musical that lacks for color, either; take a look at this scene from a dance held at the internment camp where the Kimura family is forced to reside:

I absolutely love these costumes because they infuse a musical that is dark in tone and theme with some vibrancy and really stand out. People had to make their own light in the darkness, to borrow a cliched phrase, and one of the ways to do that was by continuing to dress as they might have when they were free Americans. The dresses on each of the women are bright and lively, and the patterns add a sense of fun and whimsy to the scene. That was absolutely an intentional decision on the part of the costume designer. Notice the starkness of the scene and set design, with the foreboding structure of the camp as the background. But this is a dance, a social event put on by the community that formed within the camp itself. When you are in the worst of circumstances, sometimes you try and build a little joy into it, and that’s not a bad thing to do in order to cope with tragedy.

The purple family predominates in this still and in these dresses. There are reddish-purples, a violet, and even a darker purple, all of which bring out the festive nature of the scene itself. The men are costumed in relatively formal attire, vests and sport coats and formal slacks, and it really adds to the scene itself. This is one of those areas where costuming can really change a production. These are people trying to inject some enjoyment and normality into a daily life that is anything but normal. The clothes they wear help to put them in the right frame of mind to do just that.

As I always do with my full musical reviews, I want to look at a couple of the leading lady’s costumes in a bit more detail. Lea Salonga is (personal opinion!) one of the prettiest women to grace the Broadway stage, and brings with that beauty a sense of gravity and dignity that not every actress is capable of bringing to a role; in that sense, I would put her in a category with greats like Audra McDonald or Bernadette Peters. Mr Vietti clearly had his work cut out for him in constructing and designing costumes to fit the actress’ talent and skill, and I think that he succeeded. Let’s take a closer look:

This is one of the chief promotional images for the musical, and the costume is classic 1940s design. Ms Salonga is outfitted in a plain, navy blue skirt that is formed by straight lines and rests close to her legs without being form-fitting. The blouse itself is a cream color that contrasts nicely, with a series of brown buttons in the front that match the simple, thin brown belt at the waist. But it’s the pattern on the blouse that I find most attractive. A series of small, even dainty blue flowers is replicated throughout the blouse, with even smaller flowers throughout the collar.

I really like the look of this, and one of the metrics I use for “everyday” costumes is whether or not I can envision women I know who lived through the era of a musical being able to pluck it out of their closet. This design by Mr Vietti definitely fits that standard to a T. I could very easily see my grandmother wearing an outfit like this, especially in her early working days. It’s feminine without being saccharine, it’s functional without being unpleasant to look at, and it’s professional without being boring. Those are not easy needles to thread!

Before I close the review, there is one more costume Ms Salonga wears that I want to take a look at. It’s the one she wears for her closing number and for her bows, and it returns to the purple family that I mentioned earlier. Plum is not a color that I associate with being used overly much on Broadway, and so that makes it all the more special here:

The color alone is visually stunning, and even in a lineup for bows, it stands out in all the right ways. It’s dark, it’s sumptuous, and it’s rich. The fabric itself is almost satiny, and it flows in a way that many of the costumes in this particular production were not designed to do, adding an element to its uniqueness. But it’s the jacket that goes as the top of this dress that really makes me enjoy and admire the costume. There’s an element of power and agency that it brings to the character and to Ms Salonga that many of the other costumes have not, despite being beautifully designed. This jacket feels like a more feminine, very early version of some of the power suit designs that I have reviewed for other productions.

The cut of the jacket is smooth and elegant, and the triple buttons are large and impressive, acting as a kind of adornment to the jacket itself. There is also a little bit of detail work--just a hint--on the shoulders to the side of the lapels. That’s a neat addition that helps this costume to pop a little bit more, and it makes it easily my favorite entry in Ms Salonga’s Allegiance wardrobe.

On the whole, I like the costume designs Mr Vietti put out for Allegiance. They’re classic and fit the time period really well, and because it’s an original musical, he has set the tone for any future productions or revivals should they occur. I think it’s a pity that the musical did not last longer on Broadway, but I am hopeful that L.A. audiences (who may have a stronger emotional pull to the subject of the musical) will appreciate it the way that its East Coast fans do, and that a national tour will be in the offing at some point. This is an important musical, with important and beautiful costumes, and I really enjoyed having the opportunity to review it.

That wraps up my review of Allegiance, which I was very happy to have jump the queue. Remember: if you have a favorite musical you want me to take a look at, feel free to pop a suggestion in the Ask box or send me a message here or on my main account. I can’t make guarantees, but so far I’ve been able to hit a few fan and reader favorites and I will always try my best!

Stay tuned for more costume reviews towards the weekend, dear readers!

#allegiance #alejo vietti #broadway #musicals #lea salonga #theatre #costumery

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thomisaacs · 4 years ago

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The Passagio: Understanding Registers Within Laryngeal Vibratory Mechanisms

Preface

I've been studying singing for around 9 years now, and the concept of my passagio has always been something very nebulous to me. While I may have had a surface level understanding of the difference between registers, internally I still understood them in a very unnuanced way. Falsetto was just some magical upper setting that somehow felt different and allowed me to achieve higher pitches, for instance, but I never understood the process at a granular level.

When starting at university, something became very apparent very fast: I didn't know my way around my voice as well as I thought I did. Suddenly I was singing with an amplified band for the first time, and it felt like all those years of classical and musical theatre training went out the window as I was left uncertain of how to project my voice over the band. I couldn't hit high notes that under any other circumstances would have sat comfortably in my range, and so had to find workarounds like taking a lower harmony while a female vocalist covered what I was actually supposed to be singing.

This was, of course, treating the symptom rather than the cause. As a singer in the real world, an employer isn't going to accept you rearranging their music to suit your inabilities. In order to improve this, I spent several months researching what constitutes phonation, register, and passagio at the base level. The following is what I have discovered.

Introduction

A singer's "break" or "passagio" is a concrete phenomenon with a roster of very vague explanations. A singing teacher might refer to it as "moving between your chest voice and your head voice", but what's meant by this varies wildly depending on parameters such as the singer's age, sex, etc. These registers are defined solely by how they feel to the singer, which is by no means a consistent metric. In this essay I will attempt to explain the concept of a passagio within a consistent, measurable, scientific framework, with the intent of better understanding how to traverse it in a musical context.

Before we can understand what constitutes a passagio, however, we must first understand how the voice is produced.

Components of an Instrument

All instruments consist of at least three main components. A motor, a vibrator, and a resonator. The motor can be defined as any sort of external influence that powers the vibrator, which then oscillates at pitch, and is amplified by the instrument's resonator.

The dilemma that we singers inevitably face is that we have no convenient visual interface for how our instrument produces sound; everything is internal. While it's obvious to a guitarist, for instance, that their fingers power their strings, whose vibrations are amplified by the instrument's resonant body - we have to deal with a lot of very complicated and unintuitive language for a process that feels very intuitive and natural.

So what are the components of our instrument?

Our motor, obviously, is our lungs - which are supported by a large muscle in the abdomen called the diaphragm.

Our vibrator is our vocal folds - two flaps of flesh and mucous, located in our larynx, (colloquially known as our "voice box"). (Pictured below[1], in abducted and adducted postures respectively)

Our resonator essentially boils down to "everything", but more specific examples include our nasal cavities and chest.

And finally, our articulator consists of our mouth. Our lips, teeth, tongue, soft palate, etc. all contribute to our filtering of sound into language. The same carries over to singing.

Phonation

Phonation is the process of producing sound by way of the vocal folds. The cycle of sound production begins with the folds more or less closed, pressing against each other. As pressure is applied by airflow from the lungs, the folds are blown apart for a moment, before returning to their closed setting. This, fundamentally, is the process of phonation. This oscillation occurs hundreds of times a second - producing a pitched sound.

For the purposes of this essay, we will consider the vocal folds to consist of three main components: the vocalis muscle, connective tissue, and mucosal layer.

Pitch

In any acoustic vibration, the pitch is dictated by the mass of the thing doing the vibrating. Since it takes more energy to move something of a higher mass, the more massive a medium is, the lower the frequency of its vibration will be.

Since we can't magically manipulate the mass of something without violating the laws of physics, we have to compromise. What we're able to do is manipulate how much mass is participating in the vibration. A guitarist, for instance, does this by pressing a string against a fret, changing the stopping point of the string and thus reducing how much mass is participating in the vibration.

The vocal folds operate under the same principle. The vocalis muscles (which make up the majority of the body of the vocal fold) and cricothyroid muscles pull against each other, thus providing tension and thinning and thickening the folds as required. Thin, tense folds will vibrate at a higher frequency than long, loose folds.

Laryngeal Vibratory Mechanisms

With all of that out of the way, let's discuss how this applies to one's Passagio.

As the frequency of the vibration goes up, the physical limits of the components of the vocal folds are reached in succession. We refer to these as Laryngeal Vibratory Mechanisms (LVMs) - four different settings of vocal fold vibration that encompass what we colloquially consider to be “registers��.

The LVMs are numbered 0-3. (The following images are intended to be animated GIFs. Direct links to the images are available in the bibliography if they do not appear correctly on your browser.)

Mechanism 0 can be referred to scientifically as "pulse phonation" and colloquially as "vocal fry". Essentially, what's happening here is the majority of the vocal folds are vibrating against each other at a low frequency.

Mechanism 1 is where our voices normally sit in day-to-day use: it covers the same ground as what would be referred to as “chest voice”. The full body of the folds are vibrating - it can be thought of as speech quality. (Pictured below [2a])

Mechanism 2 (pictured below[2b]) can be thought of as head voice, falsetto, etc. In this setting, the vocalis muscles (red) and connective tissue (yellow) are both rigid, and only the mucosal layer (orange) is vibrating. This is why we experience a break - we're literally shifting to a different mode of vibration all together.

Mechanism 3 relates to the whistle register, where even the mucosal layer is rigid, and the sound is produced under the same principle as whistling with our lips.

A more intuitive parallel for this would be to imagine this process in the context of drumming. If a drummer is playing a relatively low tempo pulse, they can get away with using their arm in the motion (M0), but as the tempo is raised it no longer becomes energy-efficient to do this. At this point, the arm becomes rigid and the motion is carried out via the wrist (M1). The same limit is reached here and it becomes too tiring to move so much mass for such a small motion, so the drummer switches to finger control (M2), allowing them to play much faster passages.

Below is a Sonogram of an ascending vocal glissando, showing the four natural “breaks” or transitions between mechanisms[3].

Registers Within the LVM Framework

The temptation here is to think that LVMs are a complete replacement to the idea of registers; they’re not, they’re just a standardised way of talking about the voice.

Registers definitely still have a place in our vocabulary, it’s just important to not conflate them with Mechanisms. For instance, it’s possible to switch register, while still remaining within the same LVM. Pictured below is a table of the four mechanisms and what registers fit within them[3].

Exercises

Interesting as it may be, the passagio is often an annoyance that we can only really cheat around. The only way to navigate it fluently is to have a developed understanding of how it works and where it sits in your range.

In my case, I found it helpful to learn how to cheat my way past the passagio by skipping past it using an unvoiced consonant (a consonant wherein the vocal folds aren’t vibrating). Doing octaves over the passagio on “sha”, “sa”, “tha”, “ti”, etc. is a very helpful way of developing this. The more consonants you practice with, the easier it will be to use this technique intuitively in a song.

If you must sing over your passagio, there are ways to make the process a little more forgiving. When the vocal folds vibrate, we can think of them as having what’s called an open and closed quotient. Essentially what these refer to is the ratio of how long the vocal folds are closed, vs how long they spend open during the phonation cycle (this is similar to the concept of a “duty cycle” in electrical oscillations). A high closed quotient sounds buzzy whereas a high open quotient sounds smooth and almost breathy at higher levels. What we want is to sing with a high open quotient and sing confidently through the passagio, which lessens the dramatic timbral shift of the transition (although it doesn’t eliminate it).

In Conclusion

Learning about LVMs has provided an invaluable boost to my singing ability. I’m much more confident in and aware of my technique, because I now understand the processes at the fundamental level. Going forward, I’d like to make more singers aware of this system of classification - as it’s not something we tend to learn about in music education. If nothing else, it’s just very, very interesting - and that’s as good a reason to learn about something as any.

Bibliography

[1] Voicedoctorla.com. (2018). Vocal Nodules / Nodes. [online] Available at: https://voicedoctorla.com/voice-disorders/vocal-nodules-nodes/ [Accessed 23 May 2018].

[2] En.wikipedia.org. (2018). Vocal folds. [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vocal_folds#Oscillation [Accessed 23 May 2018].

*note: I’m aware of the issues that come with citing Wikipedia as a source, but the two images in particular that I borrowed from them for use in this essay are a perfect visualisation of the point I’m trying to make, and I thought it a shame to die on the hill of not citing Wikipedia, rather than to produce a piece of work that A) I’m proud of and B) is readable/understandable. My main points come from other, more reliable sources.

[2a] M1 Oscillation - direct image link: https://i.imgur.com/B3Nc2xr.gif

[2b] M2 Oscillation - direct image link: https://i.imgur.com/2rMR67w.gif

[3] Roubeau, B., Henrich, N. and Castellengo, M. (2009). Laryngeal Vibratory Mechanisms: The Notion of Vocal Register Revisited. Journal of Voice, 23(4), pp.425-438.

[4] /u/GrafKarpador (2018). what happens physiologically when i change between two pitches? what should be changing, and what should not? • r/singing. [online] reddit. Available at: https://www.reddit.com/r/singing/comments/86i0tl/what_happens_physiologically_when_i_change/dw5d952/?context=0 [Accessed 23 May 2018].

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gabrielalexandebrubaker95 · 5 years ago

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Reiki Therapy Classes

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Learning Reiki 2

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#Reiki E Cure Palliative Prodigious Unique Ideas #Narayan Reiki Symbol

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uncle-ak · 5 years ago

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What is Your Perspective?

What a time to live through… How many hundred years later?! I couldn't wrap my mind around what I saw. It was about 8pm in the evening, I was laying on the couch reading news articles, flipping between that and other articles about health and wellness. I stopped actively watching TV back in 2009 (story for another day) so reading articles to stay up to date on what’s going on in the US and around the world or reading a book is how I typically wine down during the weekdays after work especially since we have been in quarantine.

In the course of reading, I was also going between WhatsApp statuses and Instagram stories. I can’t recall where I clicked a link… First, a little background story about me related to the subject matter. I am naturally very observant, attention to details comes to me easily without trying. As such I would say I have a good visual memory. I tend to see and listen deeper; it just happens. From body language to the slightest change in pitch/tone during conversation. Because of this, I am very picky about what I watch and listen to. As such I resulted to staying updated via reading versus watching depending on the subject matter. For the same reason, I seldom watch movies about slavery, racism or anything along those lines but I sure have read a number of stories/articles, books and continue to read.

A friend visited back in April and during a conversation, she asked if I had seen the video of how Ahmaud Arbery (RIP) was murdered. I said nope thank you! I’ve read multiple articles on the story so I have an idea of how it happened. She suggested I watch it and I insisted nope thanks! My visual memory will replay it over and over. There is a part of me that can get a little too emotional even though I don’t typically wear my emotions on my sleeves. Reading Ahmaud’s story wasn’t easy to digest but I find words more palatable than images especially given the subject matter. Same with the story of Breonna Taylor (RIP), I read about it and she was murdered the day before my birthday…

So back to clicking that link… Before being able to make sense of what was going on, I heard the words “I can’t breathe.” I immediately had a flashback of Eric Garner’s story (RIP) which I only read as well; I didn’t watch any video on purpose. My initial instinct was to exit that link but a part of me was curious, wondering and hoping that when the cop heard the words “I can’t breathe” he would get off of George Floyd or at the very least ease off the pressure. I was hopeful because my thought process was driven by the fact that I work in the healthcare system and when someone says “I can’t breathe,” everyone in the vicinity rushes in the direction of where that phrase was uttered and attends to the person.

Initially, it didn’t occur to me that this cop was kneeling on his neck. I thought it was his shoulder or back. As he continued to say “I can’t breathe,’’ I slowly went from laying on the couch to sitting up. Then I realized the cop was kneeling on his neck, the cop had his hand in his pocket with an annoying smirk on his face while the other cop stood there like… (Let me save my words). Boy did that hurt to watch and it aches to recount it. I turned my phone away but the sound was still on. Then I couldn’t hear “I can’t breathe” anymore so I assumed the cop was off of him. That cop stayed on George Floyd even after he stopped uttering those words and wasn’t moving. For 8minutes and 46seconds... till the EMTs got there. Will it be right to assume that if the EMTs didn’t get there when they did, that cop would have been kneeling on his neck much longer? Oh, by the way, I know the cop’s name including the others, I just don’t feel like addressing them by their names because in my opinion, it isn’t worth it.

There goes my visual memory, it is actually more detailed than that but I’ll save myself the heartache. I exited the link and put my phone facedown. I sat still for a moment and tears trickled down my cheeks. I had a VERY restless night, the following day was emotionally rough and so was the rest of the week at work. As the week unfolded and more stories came out, there were moments I wished I didn’t watch that video because, for some unknown reason, it hit me differently. George Floyd presents with physical characteristics as my two younger brothers; height and obviously black! There’s no way to justify that the cop didn’t intend to kill him, but the ‘system’... Yes, I have read stories about black on black crimes being reported to be more than white on black crimes but there is more to what meets the eye with regards to reports about black on black crimes and it is no justification to brush off the killing of black people by while cops especially in the manner in which it happened in George Floyd’s case.

I wondered why in 2020; how many hundred years later, things like this are still happening. With all the evolution and civilization, I wonder how some people could still be mentally stuck in an era that viewed a certain group of people as a threat or a prey just because of their skin color. I was reminded of these books I’ve read; Defining Moments in Black History: Reading Between The Lines by Dick Gregory and Born a Crime by Trevor Noah. Then I’m reminded of Trayvon Martin (RIP) as I type Trevor Noah. I love hooded sweaters and each time I put on one, Trayvon Martin crosses my mind, and depending on where I am when I have it on, sometimes I would take off for fear of being stereotyped as a threat.

About being a BLACK Woman; I am reminded of the book We are Going to Need More Wine by Gabrielle Union, this book opened my mind’s eye to deeper and more in-depth things being brushed off in regards to black women; double minority. Then boom! Oluwatoyin Salau (RIP) was raped, reported missing, and later found dead. A young vibrant activist at the frontline of the Black Lives Matter movement. It hurt to read that she was violated and disrespected by someone like whom she fought for.

While on the emotional healing journey, the Rayshard Brooks (RIP) incident happened. Not to forget the people found hanging being ruled as 'suicide'. I'm sure there’s a lot more going on with regard to the subject matter. To say I was emotionally ‘tayad’ doesn’t even begin to describe it. Prior to this incident, I was still trying to understand the defund the police and police reform movement; the purpose, and what it entailed. Then out of curiosity, I wanted to know how long it takes to become a police officer. To put things into perspective, it takes more training time to become a barber than it takes to become a police officer (article). Even though the article isn’t as recent, has anything changed since then?!

So while my emotions have been going through this roller coaster in addition to dealing with COVID-19 as a healthcare employee; multiple deaths at work, the passing away of family friends, and family friends losing their loved ones, Sis needed mental rehabilitation. In the midst of all the chaos, I came across a video of an African Woman (apparently Cameroonian, where I am from) sharing her opinion about the unimportance of the Black Lives Matter Movement and how she wasn’t oppressed and bla bla bla. Listening to that 9minutes video initially made my blood boil, then I realized some of what she said either came from a place of lack of information and or misinformation. Then I was reminded of the Stuck in The Middle (Sitmpod) Couch Talk; The Relationship Between Africans and African Americans and Bridging The Divide.

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I would plead that my African people watch these because there seems to be a disconnect. I have read/heard comments along the lines of “it is an African-American only problem, it doesn’t concern us Africans.” Well oh well, news flash! It is a BLACK people problem which unfortunately boils down to our skin color. And if we Africans plan to have and raise kids in this country, we better wake up to the reality of what it is, educate ourselves and collectively change the narrative. I want to say how about we collectively come together and uplift the African continent, especially in this era of people tracing their heritage but that’s a conversation for another day.

During my moments of introspection following the George Floyd incident, I realized that even though I earlier wished I could unsee that video; I, however, felt that my journey to seeking knowledge and improving awareness out of the confines of a school curriculum which initially started when I was 13years old had brought me to this point. Something within me had been drastically awakened. I can’t put a finger on it but I know something is different including the desire to want to learn more and improve my society, knowledge, health, and wellness. I go between trying to stay updated, sieving through loads of information (on Instagram (IG); the only social media I’m on, and or news articles that I get notifications for) and wanting to be part of positive change. I have gone through incremental bursts of awakening, first in the Fall of 2009 when I transferred from a predominantly black community college to a four year predominantly white university, then grad school in the Fall of 2012 with the same demographic. My experience in both institutions is a story for another day… I must say grad school introduced me to a whole lot of things too fast too soon.

At the beginning of 2013 (second semester in grad school), I read the book The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren and felt the desire to get more involved in the community. In February, while on a book club conference line, I expressed that desire and on that call was the founder of a community-based organization then known as A Friend to The Homeless today is known as Generosity Global. The Founder Rich Akwo has been a guest on the Sitmpod. My exposure while volunteering during the Selfless Saturdays from then and learning all that I learned and continue to learn among which was the importance of supporting small/local and BLACK owned businesses. Generosity Global also has a clothing line from which most of my T-shirts and sweaters are from; The All is Well/Thumbs Up clothing with positive uplifting messages to brighten my day and anyone I come across. Adding to my t-shirt and hooded sweater collecting is the SitmpodMech

My journey to improving awareness in general and supporting BLACK owned businesses has widened thanks to the guests who have been on the Sitmpod. I do consume a number of the products and services from guests who have been on the podcast and if they provide a service/sell products that I personally do not use/need, I share via WhatsApp or IG. I must say I have learned at least one thing from ALL the guests thus far and some messages have been reiterated via different experiences and perspectives.

From all that has unfolded thus far, I have learned a whole lot. I never knew about Juneteenth and Black Wall Street prior to now. I wasn’t aware of the laws that govern police officers and how one could pretty much blink their eyes or snap their fingers and the training to becoming an officer will be completed. It has been all that and more and the journey to learning doesn’t end here for me. It actually just intensified…

During a recent Stuck in The Middle Couch Talk, Taalib Saber concluded with a powerful message. Watch video.

On that note, I’ll leave you with this quote; “Emancipate yourself from mental slavery.”~ What do you understand by this quote? What have you learned from all that has been happening? What is your perspective? How do you plan to channel your acquired knowledge, experience and energy? Share your story, it will be empowering to someone else.

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