The days are winding down on the Paterson administration in Albany. David Paterson will cede the governor's office to Andrew Cuomo at year's end. The governor has been summing up his tumultuous two and a half years at the helm of state government, in a series of interviews. His latest was with YNN's Bill Carey.

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NEW YORK STATE -- It has been a little over two and a half years since David Paterson, a long time State Senator coaxed into running for Lieutenant Governor by Eliot Spitzer, found himself in a job he never expected to hold. Spitzer had resigned in a prostitution scandal. And Paterson was now Governor of New York.

"Most exciting thing that happened to me in my life. Something that I never expected. And, a challenge, difficult, acrimonious at times, always a struggle," Paterson said.

By the time 2010 arrived, any plans David Paterson had to run for a full term as Governor were scrapped. The decline in popularity had started early on. He quickly admitted to past failings, using drugs, extra-marital affairs. Admissions he now says he may have made too early.

"It might not have been the right time, so quickly after taking office. I never saw it as inhibiting. What it did do, though, was to ignite a feeding frenzy in the media that I wasn't expecting that claimed almost anyone that knew me," Paterson said.

There was the brouhaha over the process he used to select Hillary Clinton's successor and leaks from his office about Caroline Kennedy's bid for the job. Battles with the legislature over budgets. But still, Paterson planned to run. Until the New York Times reported a scandal involving an aide to the governor, David Johnson, involving domestic abuse. Paterson now claims the media used the event as the basis for spreading rumors about him.

"These were all made up stories, designed to harm me and the media was not investigating these sources, whoever they were," Paterson said.

In the years to come, Paterson says he will probably return to teaching, something he's done in the past. One thing he seems to rule out is any run for political office.

"Some exciting people who will come along and grace the halls of Albany now that I have gone ahead. I would not expect to be running for anything," Paterson said.

It will be David Paterson, private citizen.