Tuesday 12 October 2010

Why is Keith Speck leaving Santander Asset Management?

But wild beasts of the desert shall lie there; and their houses shall be full of doleful creatures; and owls shall dwell there, and satyrs shall dance there - Isaiah 13:21

Oh, we know who's replacing him. Tom Caddick. Caddick will become head of multi-manager, whatever that is. But why is Keith Speck leaving Santander Asset Management? [And I had absolutely no idea that Santander was into managing assets. You live and learn, don't you?] No one knows. It's one of these mysteries I'm so fond of. But I can imagine.

But I will not imagine. I refuse to imagine! If Mr Speck is planning to roll around in astral sands, good luck to him! I will not imagine it. I will not see Keith in mad visions. If Keith is going to dance beneath the moon ... oh, dear reader, if you have knowledge of any such plans, or can imagine them, do me a favour, eh? Keep them to yourself.

It's not that I'm leaving the visionary life behind. I would never do that. It's just that some of these bankers annoy me - the way they expect to be imagined by me, to appear in my visions, and ultimately, to be written about in this blog. Keith is one such banker. He has been pestering me for months. He will deny this, of course. But the fact remains that when Keith falls to sleep at night he drifts over to wherever I happen to be and tries to get into my subconscious. This is his idea of how a grown man should behave. And now, what does he do? He runs away from Santander in the wild hope that I will be intrigued enough to write about him. No! I will not write about him. I refuse to even think about him. If he has set his heart on wandering in the desert, good luck to him! Good luck to him again. And again, and again, and again. For he will need as much luck as he can get. He is not a financial shaman. He has no experience of the mystical life. How will he deal with the astral snakes, the astral jackals? He doesn't know. He hasn't considered the dangers, has he? What a fool! By the way, the astral jackals aren't that dangerous. They may take a bite out of your astral body, or rather, Keith's astral body. [I don't know why I'm getting you involved in this.] But he should watch out for the snakes.

And yet - why is Keith Speck leaving Santander Asset Management? Why oh why oh why? A better question would be: why am I so weak? Another question: why do I give in to these people? One more question: why the Bible quote? Well, I was looking for something about jackals in the desert, and found that. But enough of questions! As Dylan Thomas once wrote, questions are hunchbacks to the poker marrow. [How true!]

Dear reader, Keith is leaving for reasons best known to himself, and we will have to be content with that. I have no proof he's heading for the desert. He'll probably turn up at another asset manager at some point. It's likely to be something as unglamorous as that. Then we'll laugh about this. Keith will have embarrassed himself terribly, and we'll be laughing. It doesn't pay to pretend you're the mystical sort when you're patently not. But we'll see.