One word from Mark Davidson in Wednesday's tribute piece to Steven Anderton summed him up perfectly - ''professional''.
I can't recall exactly when I first met Steve in the flesh, although searching back through the archives, I talked to him before The Solitaire's trip to Timaru in late December 2012.
I discovered something straight away - he always had time to talk to me and other media, clearly cognisant of the importance of getting thoroughbred racing as much exposure as possible.
Naturally, being a trainer of some of Otago's best gallopers, Steve fielded many phone calls from me over the past couple of years.
There was never a time when he was short or less than interested in the call and, particularly given his young family and a busy stable, I appreciated his willingness to give me his full and honest appraisal of his horses' chances.
You could tell he was a thinker - very careful about where he placed his horses - and, as Tony Dennis said to me on Tuesday night, Steve and Claire could often spot a horse going sore before it even became noticeable.
As others will attest, he was the first to say gidday if you wandered through the tie-up stalls at Wingatui - be it on raceday or on a midweek trackwork morning.
It was a pleasure to stop and have a chat with him for a minute, just chewing the fat - a common thread with many of the great people in racing in the lower South Island.
By late 2014, even though we discovered we both loved the musical stylings of John Farnham, he had decided I deserved a little winding up.
I had taken a trip to the States in February, and nabbed a week to Queensland in October.
Steve was convinced I was on holiday more than I was at work (it just appears that way) and asked me how he could get into racing journalism so he could enjoy the same amount of time off.
He also warned me (in the most jovial of ways) that he was considering ''barring me'' from interviewing him before a meeting, as he reckoned he didn't have that much luck if he featured in a preview.
I joked with him about that at Wingatui on Saturday but, after I left the abandoned meeting, I remembered I had previewed The Diamond One before last year's White Robe Lodge, which she went on to win.
I made a mental note on the drive back to Dunedin, planning to bring that up with Steve this week - again, with my tongue firmly in cheek.
But, like so many others, my conversations with Steve have been cruelly cut short.
Lazy FiverI'll give you the choice of either sticking with Belle Miraaj - my tip last week which never ran - or backing Parramatta in race 10 at Ashburton tomorrow.
