Scott Taylor was the most recently hired reporter on the Sun Journal’s city staff so technically, he’s our rookie. Welcome aboard, noob!

Of course, that was 15 years ago. By this point, Taylor has seen and done as much in the Twin Cities as any veteran of the news game.

He’s the reporter most likely to be asked to capture a bat, chickadee or monster spider that has wandered into the newsroom.

He’s the most likely to be called upon for help in matters of spreadsheets, contact information for obscure city officials and anything involving a phone, tablet or laptop.

Scott is the only reporter I know who can summarize an entire city council meeting using a variety of voices, including a cranky old woman, stuffy politico, whiny child and wise-cracking alley cat.

And now he’s leaving. The dude who filled my head with so much esoteric craziness (I had no idea what Creepypasta was until Scott told me) is packing up and heading west. Why is he leaving? Where is he going?

We caught up with Scott and asked these questions. Here are his answers, presumably offered in a variety of hilarious voices.

What brought you to Maine all those years ago? The Mexican food.

Really, though, it was just a great opportunity that presented itself. My wife and I had heard good things about Maine — semirural, good place to raise a family, good schools, safe, inexpensive.

Most of that turned out to be true, so when the job opened at the SJ, I jumped.

Once I got my family across the Piscataqua Bridge, I just needed a couple more years to convince them to settle in L-A.

What do you remember about your first few days at the paper? My first night here, I covered a Lewiston Planning Board hearing about a controversial development up on East Avenue that just turned out to be a new Shaw’s. That kind of set the tone for a lot of stories like that: Developer comes along and people either wig out and chase him out of town with virtual pitchforks or it eventually blends into the background and people act like it was always there.

The other thing that stands out, in certain contrast to today, is just how many people were in that Sun Journal newsroom. I mean, there were tons of people bustling around and bumping into each other and telling each other to “shush” over the squawk of the police radio. It was a busy, dynamic and fun place to dive into. It’s still dynamic and fun, but there are far fewer of us today. (I still get told to shush, by the way.) But everybody was kind and welcoming to this goofball from away who just did not know that there were several ways to pronounce the last name “Boucher” — and one was a distinctly Lewiston version.

What are you going to miss the most? Seeing certain faces on a right-regular basis.

We’ve made some really good friends, folks that absolutely changed our lives, and I’m going to miss checking in on them.

There are many people I’ve worked with and covered and that I enjoy seeing, too. These towns are full of good, smart, hardworking folks, and they’ve been a pleasure to talk to and bother with my questions.

And then there are people I’m only on nodding acquaintance with that I’m going to miss seeing out walking around the downtown, with their dogs and shopping bags full of whatever or sweeping the sidewalk in front of their store. I like seeing those folks and wondering about them, knowing that there’s a story in there somewhere and they are just almost ready to tell it.

What are you going to miss the least? Well, there’s a face or two I’ll be more than pleased to see one last time in my rearview mirror. I won’t miss the scraping and shoveling the sidewalks every morning in February, March and April to keep the ice from sneaking in and strangling your sidewalk access, and I won’t miss four hours of sunlight in December.

Your voices are legendary. I personally enjoy “cranky old man complaining about children” the most. Are there any voices you CAN’T do? Mark LaFlamme offering to do a weather story: “Ah, c’mon guys, it’s just snowing so darn much! It’s like the third storm this week! We gotta write something!”

Just too damn implausible. Nobody’d believe it.

Where are you off to? I’m headed back to the Front Range of Colorado, land of the temperature inversion, static cling, green chili and almost as many craft beers per capita as Lewiston-Auburn. No idea what I’m going do just yet, other than be with my family for a bit — and enjoy some really good Mexican food.