Thanks to all!

Many thanks to so many people who have commented on my 25 years with The Star. Mostly complimentary, which is nicer still.

Every morning I wake up and think, "OK, today's the day they're gonna tell me I have to go get a real job.''

When I got out of engineering school, the two things I wanted to do were race cars and play in a rock 'n' roll band. The two things I swore I'd never do were teach, or have anything to do with computers.

Six years later, I was racing cars, playing in a rock 'n' roll band, and teaching computing at Ryerson.

So much for career planning.

And through a series of flukes too long and too boring to go into here, I lucked in to this gig.

Still racing cars (OK, rallying - close enough. The seventh annual Targa Newfoundland is coming up this September.)

Still playing in a rock 'n' roll band (had a gig yesterday; I sound like a CBC newscaster this morning. Scream out 'Mony Mony' at the top of your lungs and you'd be a little hoarse too. "The Compleat Works on their Mid-Life Crisis Tour." Our motto - "They weren’t oldies when we started playing them!")

But mostly, I've got the best automotive journalism job in the country, maybe the world.

Thanks to you, dear readers, for putting up with me for a quarter of a century. Geez, it seems a lot longer when put like that.

Thanks to The Star, for their never-flagging support, especially when I take on some contentious issues. (BTW, I NEVER advocated street racing; it's the O.P.P. which by turning regular commuters into street racers is denigrating the fight against REAL street racers.)

Thanks to a series of terrific editors over the years, who have kept me semi-under control.

Initially, John McDonald (no no, not the Blue Jays shortstop). That was pre-Wheels, when my column appeared in the Monday paper in the Life section, underneath the rutabaga recipes. Even my Mother couldn't find it half the time.

The late Dennis Morgan, founder of Wheels.

Richard Young, still on duty.

Joe Knycha, now with Formula Publications.

John Terauds, still with The Star.

Adam Gutteridge, likewise.

And the incumbent Mark Richardson, who despite being a bikey, has taken the section to new heights.

Hope I didn’t forget anyone - I come by this gray hair honestly.

Thanks too to all my colleagues over the years who have helped make Wheels required reading for anyone even vaguely interested in the automobile in all its manifestations, for good and for bad.

Fair warning - you ain't seen nothing yet.

 

Comments

[Bill Trent]

Thank you Mr. McKenzie for the columns you have written over the last 25 years. I always look forward to reading your latest columns.

Sez Jim: Well, we can drop the "Mc", but thanks!