Hockert's a SmartMouth; Trompeter's an Emmy winner

SmartMouth is just not how former KARE11 weekend anchor Amy Hockert will be remembered around that newsroom.

Maybe we hardly knew her? "I'm known to be sarcastic from time to time," said the founder of SmartMouth Strategies. "But I just thought it was a catchy name. You've got to try to stand out a little bit." Having smartmouthstrategies.com as a Web address does that.

With offices in Minneapolis, L.A. and D.C., Hockert does media training and presentation coaching with CEOs and business owners trying to improve the profile of their brands, authors and athletes. "Anybody who is going to be coming across the media," she said.

Does she teach executives the art of avoiding the media? "Sometimes," Hockert said sheepishly. She's teaching them how to handle "today's media" versus last year's media: "Today's media is running on a skeleton crew. They don't have the time to do in-depth reporting. So now you are left with inexperienced reporters, a lot of things are falling through the cracks. If they [media avoiders] do their homework, they can take advantage of these situations and turn the interviews the way they want them to go."

Ex-anchor wins Emmy "Did you notice that Jeanette won the [Upper Midwest] Emmy for best anchor?" read an e-mail from David Azbill.

I presume this means that the real estate guy is still the manfriend of former WCCO-TV anchor Jeanette Trompeter, who lost her job to CBS budget cuts. "You can't help but wonder how the powers at 'CCO are feeling about their decision to fire Jeanette. ... On a kind of funny note, they said Frank [Vascellaro] won the Emmy ... and retracted it. I wonder what that was all about?"

WCCO-TV's spokester Kiki Rosatti said the misinformation came from another news source. She also pointed out "that Jeanette Trompeter and [KARE11 anchor] Kim Insley tied for that; the only tie of the evening. ... We did only report Frank on the Sunday morning show. We then corrected our mistake on the 10 p.m. news Sunday night. ... Of course, we gave Jeanette credit."

Trompeter attended the awards ceremony. "It's weird not being part of the team anymore," she said. "At the same time I'm glad I went, not just because I got an award, but because I got to see some people I haven't since the day I walked out the door."

The award will not fill the void created by the death of her Husky Madelyn, who is eulogized at www.jeanettetrompeter.com.

While she appreciates Azbill's support, "I wish my boyfriend would keep his mouth shut. He just likes to stir things up," she said with a laugh.

Meshbesher's star turn Locally famous attorney Ron Meshbesher may be up for some worldwide acclaim as a result of scenes shot at the law offices of Meshbesher & Spence for Joel and Ethan Coen's movie "A Serous Man."

With his wife, Kim, his brother and attorney, Kenny Meshbesher, and Kenny's wife, Katy, Ron attended last weekend's movie premiere at the Walker Art Center and caught up with one of the Coens afterward. "I just talked to Joel," Ron told me Wednesday. "He said, You're the star of the show. Your name is mentioned more than anybody else's."

Meshbesher's favorite dialogue is when the ne'er-do-well brother needs a lawyer, and a character says, "You should get Ron Meshbesher," Ron recalled, "Then the guy says, I'll bet he's expensive, and the guy says, He's not cheap.