Matt of All Trades blog, like the title suggests, is by a Vermont author and offers offbeat musings on pop culture, media, journalism, humor, weirdness, stupid people, smart people, my life as a journalist, landscaper, photographer, married gay man, dog lover and weather geek and more. It's run by me, Matt Sutkoski, a native Vermonter living in St. Albans, Vt.
In this absurd lip reading world, we learn Nancy Pelosi and Mike Pence don't get along (no surprise there).
We also learn how much animosity Bernie Sanders feels toward Trump. In the bad lip reading, Sanders tells a colleague, "I want to roast all of his fingers."
And thatfamous Pelosi clap backwas actually approval when Trump told the Halls of Congress: "I like a pizza party very much."
Here's the rest of the craziness for your deep winter entertainment:
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, pretending to be a "bad guy" at a Congressional hearing, vividly illustrated how corrupt campaign finance "laws" are
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is now both a celebrity and a newly minted member of Congress
She's attracting lots of buzz, that's for sure. She's new in Congress. So like every new member of Congress, I haven't decided yet if I like the job she's doing in Washington. Time will tell.
I have to hand it to her, though. She's very good at explaining what she think's is wrong with our government, our system, our rules.
She does it in a way that doesn't insult our intelligence but also doesn't talk down to us. Love her or hate her, she's pretty real. A viral video, which you can see at the bottom of this post, proves the point.
Ocasio-Cortez is making it plain that there's plenty of room for reform. She did a great job the other day by turning a Congressional hearing into a bit of a game, a lightining round of questioning, as she put it.
She took the role of a "bad guy," figuring half the room has long since decided she's a "bad guy" anyway. She asked a panel of experts, if she were indeed a "bad guy," about whether she could legally get away with some bad stuff to get elected. "I want to get away with as much bad things as possible, ideally to enrich myself and advance my interests," she said.
So, if she wanted to run a campaign entirely fumded by corporate poltical action committees, could she do that?
The answer is yes.
If the "bad guy" candidate had skeletons in his or her closet that needed to be covered up, are hush funds to witnesses legal?
The answer is yes.
Say tbe bad guy is elected. Is there any limits on what legislation he or she can work on in behalf of industry?
The answer is no.
The whole exchange at this Congressional hearing is incredibly instructive and worth the watch. Here it is:
Jeff helping to pick out a Christmas tree a few years ago.
Today is my husband Jeff Modereger's birthday.
I'm not going to tell you which number birthday or in which year he was born, because that would be rude. But it's a significant number. And it's coming in a year that is bringing big changes to his life, our life.
Jeff will retire from the University of Vermont this coming May. He's been at UVM for a quarter century. His departure will be a big adjustment for him, for the university, and I would argue for the community at large.
As he retires, he doesn't want hoopla. He wants to ride off into the sunset, as he puts it. As if his retirement is some sort of end. It's actually a beginning.
Some people, when they get to retirement age, do fade away. Jeff won't. He doesn't have it in him to just fade. It's one of the things I love about him.
True, he'll be home more often when he retires, which is a definite plus. But he'll still continue his career as a scenic designer, which has always been his passion. He's so good at it that he'll always be demand. Probably even when he's 100 years old.
His mother worries that he pushes too hard, and it's true Jeff works too hard. (Note to Lois Modereger: I crack the whip when Jeff starts to push himself too much, and so he's fine!) The retirement this year is not a sign of him aging, but it is a sign that he's finally wising up enough to slow down, just a bit.
I'm not surprised, but always stunned by the number of his students and former students who come to Jeff and tell him what a great influence he was on them, how much he taught them. I know that will continue after he retires. Because he will meet more people, and teach more people, and just make things good. It's his habit, and he'll never be able to break it, thank goodness.
Jeff's magic is that he makes everyone he comes in contact with a better person. That certainly includes me. I'm far from perfect, but every day, Jeff, through example, shows me and everyone how it's done. As of this August, we will have been married seven years. Time flies. And I can't wait to experience the many more years I have with Jeff.
It's funny. Jeff has an eye for fashion, at least in a superficial sense. We'll tune into some show like "Project Runway," and he'll exclaim: "What is she wearing! Did she look in the mirror before she left home?!?"
Yet Jeff is completely out of fashion in a much more fundamental sense. It's not fashionable these days to have a sense of morality. To be honest. To do the right thing. Jeff does all of these things, fashion be damned. Thank Gawd. Another in a list of a billion reasons why I love him.
So Jeff: Here's to another birthday. I love you so very much, and look forward to being with you as the years tick by.
This post has been sappy, yes, but so what? I'll even make it worse with this song, which reminds me of you. Here's Carly Simon to help me out here:
Jullian Mitchell, arrested in Tennessee on identity theft charges, looks like Ken's bad little brother. I bet Barbie does NOT like him.
The crime wasn't too spectacular.
A man named Julian R. Mitchell, 20, was recently arrested in Tennessee for identity theft.
Television stationFox 17 in Nashville says Mitchell tried to use somebody else's debit card at a bar, but the business system at the tavern said the card was lost or stolen. Mitchell was asked for his ID.
He handed over a Tennessee driver's license, but police said it was "plainly obvious" to the barkeep that this wasn't Mitchell's license.
The real story here is the mug shot when Mitchell was booked. As you can see in this post, his photo is......stunning.
Stunning enough to cause a stir on social media. When local media began tweeting about Mitchell's arrest, lots of people decided to add to the news story. You know, fill it out a bit. I opinied that in an exclusive interview, Barbie's boyfriend Ken has no idea why his brother turned to a life of crime.
Other comments indicated Barbie might not be so squeaky clean: "Suspect was last seen in a red convertible with accomplice Barbie."
One person asked incredulously: "Identity theft? There are TWO people who look like that?"
Other people guessed at Mitchell's day job. I agree with one person who said he's Roger Stone's eyebrow consultant.
At least the guy isn't all match-matchy, given the blonde hair, red beard and very black, big eyebrows.
Anyway, enjoy my early nominee for Mug Shot Of The Year, 2019
Alexander Goldinsky seen here "falling" on spilled ice in a break room is accused of insurance fraud.
A gentleman in New Jersey put on an act to commit insurance fraud, authorities said. But judging from the surveillance video that caught him in the act, I doubt he's Oscar-winning material.
"Alexander Goldinsky, a 57-year-old independent contractor, was working for a company in Woodbridge, New Jersey, about 30 miles northwest of Newark, when he allegedly orchestrated the scam, according to the Middlesex County Prosecutor's Ofice. The office released surveillance video Thursday from the company's empty break room, showing Goldinsky throwing the ice and strategically sprawling himself across the floor."
Thinking nobody was around and apparently not realizing there were security cameras, Goldinsky looks pretty obvious in the video as he sprinkles the ice cubes on the floor, and then almost gingerly falls to the floor to sustain his "injuries."
Authorities said Goldinsky filed a false insurance claim for ambulance services and the treatment he received for injuries he said got from the "fall."
Goldinsky is scheduled for an initial court appearance on Thursday.
I'm also guessing he won't be at the Oscars when they are presented on February 24.
The schtick is these are revealing videos of what was really said, except the lip reading is so awful that they what they people "say" is hilariously absurd.
They've done NFL lip reading for each of the past several years. This year's NFL one is excellent. For instance, we have a sideline coach exclaiming, "In my bag! Poetry and French art!
In those NFL clips in which NFL players say something about themselves, one says. "I sleep on the happiness tree." Another says, "I melted a lot of people." One more says, "Humans shouldn't go into the labyrinth."
Yeah, everything they say is out of left field, if I may interject a baseball cliche into a football story.
This "sinkhole" in a Florida bank driveway turned out to be part
of a tunnel. Somebody was digging the tunnel in an attempt
to rob the bank.
As will become obvious, given Florida's weirdness, the following incident took place in the Sunshine State.
A sinkhole recently opened up in the driveway of a Pembroke Pines, Florida bank. That's not unusual. The geology of Florida makes the area prone to sinkholes.
It turns out, though, that geology had nothing to do with this sinkhole. It turns out somebody was digging a tunnel from an embankment toward the bank in an attempt to rob it.
But: Curses! Foiled again! The tunnel was too close to the surface. The dirt and the pavement in the driveway collapsed, which was the "sinkhole."
They haven't figured out who dug the tunnel yet. The tunnel extends 50 feet from an embankment to near the bank. It looks like whoever it was was trying to access an ATM.
The person who dug the tunnel wasn't claustrophobic, apparently. The tunnel was only two feet across or so, so you really had to shimmy and squeeze your way through it.
The FBI is investigating.
And thus, Florida continues to uphold its reputation for weirdness.
