Scooter Chronicles

Happy the Man
Why don’t more people know about these guys? For those that don’t know, they were (still are, with some line-up changes) a five piece band from Virginia. They were signed by Arista, and recorded their first two albums in the late 70’s. The label didn’t know how to market their music, so dropped them after the second album. It’s a shame because the music is SO VERY UNIQUE. It has everything for all fans. Pop, complex progressive rock, jazz to name a few. Yet making these comparisons are understatements and really don’t do enough to describe their music or give it the proper justice of how unique their sound is. My brother-in-law David has said (and I agree) that nobody sounds like The Who, and that is a compliment to how good they are and how unique their sound is. Happy the Man can be described as the same. No one that I know of sounds like them.

The band released a new album just last year, their first since 1979. They have three studio albums before that, and an album of demos before they were signed. All of these are available through AMAZON, and I strongly suggest any fan of music in general to give their first two albums a listen (“Happy the Man” and “Crafty Hands”).

Supertramp
Here is a band that like many of their time started with complex songs, and then eventually started moving towards pop music lines. However, even though I like their earlier albums more, I still love to hear the album “Breakfast in America” from time to time. It only proves their talent as songwriters.

Ken Hitchcock
I had MENTIONED when Hitch was fired as coach of the Flyers earlier this season that I thought it wasn’t a smart move. He’s a good coach, and I figured he would be coaching another team before next season. Sure enough, a month later he was hired by the Columbus Blue Jackets. I had read earlier this week that the Jackets have gone 6-3 since putting Hitch behind the bench. It may not last, but that’s what a good coach can do for a team.

I have always been a fan of the Blue Jackets. Marcia and I saw a game there in Columbus during their first season. It was nice to see the fan so excited and into the sport, though being in Ohio it didn’t surprise me that the would take to it so quickly. One of the reasons I liked them was that Doug MacLean was hired to run the team from the front office. I thought he was a good hockey guy to have there, and especially with an expansion team since he helped build and coach the Florida Panthers. The Panthers were playoff contenders from “day one”, and wound up in the Cup Finals in only their fourth season with his help. MacLean hasn’t had the same success in Columbus that he did down in Miami, but he seems to be getting the team on the right track now. Hiring Hitch in my opinion will help.

Self Feeding
This morning Nigel started doing something that we have been hoping he would start doing a couple of months ago. Feeding himself. Marcia prepared a pancake for him, cut it up, and he started grabbing the pieces and trying to put them into his own mouth. We have been hoping that with the Fruit Puffs that we keep putting out before him that he would pick it up sooner. (He loves those puffs!) And that watching his younger cousin Jordan feed herself would help. But he kept looking for us to put the food in his mouth. We knew that he would eventually pick it up. But it was more from the standpoint that it’s obviously easier on us if he can feed himself.

“OK”
Another sort of milestone for Nigel this morning. (I was informed of both of these from Marcia via phone calls.) Marcia is baby sitting Nigel’s cousin Emily today, and he went to go take something away from her. Marcia said, “Let Emily play with that, OK?” Nigel then replied “OK” to Marcia. I am sure he doesn’t know what it means, but with Marcia using that term around him often, he has since picked it up. Guess it’s time to really start watching what we say around him.