Oh, big Gartmore news yesterday. It's going out of business or something. I missed all the excitement because I was mucking about with my 'Stacy-Marie' song. Still not finished, by the way. "Stacy, Stacy, Stacy-Marie, I love you, girl, but you don't love me." Yeah, I know what you're thinking. Please bear in mind this is a pop song. The lyric does sound great with the music I've written. Back to Gartmore. [Thank God. And this is me, Michael. My square brackets have been returned in one piece.]]]] I think.]] Roger Guy and Dominic Rossi are leaving! I don't know who Dominic Rossi is. Perhaps a chief investment officer - who knows? But Roger Guy is a real shock. I thought he was staying for life. Apparently not. He's going gentle into that good night. A wild man who caught and sang the sun in flight, and learns, too late, he grieved it on its way? Possibly, but I'm not getting involved. No, what interests me is the fact that Goldman Sachs has been brought in by Gartmore to conduct a strategic review. Basically, Goldman is going to have a poke around to see if anything can be salvaged. Maybe the furniture can be sold. Or that old photocopier. It still has some life in it.
So, Goldman. This is where I come into the picture. Or I would come into the picture, if I ever wanted to work for the bank again, which I don't. Lloyd Blankfein phoned me at the crack of dawn this morning: 'Mikey, how ya doing? (I'm fine, Lloyd. How are you?) Never felt better. Making loads of money. (That's a surprise.) Mikey, what's going on with BarCap and that Bobby D? (Nothing yet.) You can't rely on him, man. He's a f**king prick. You know that, don't ya? (What do you want, Lloyd?) You've heard the Gartmore news, yeah? (A bit. It's closing down.) Yeah, well, we've got the contract. I got guys going in there, looking at all the fixtures and fittings. I don't know what they're leaving, what they're taking. They got phones and desks and s**t. Will you be censoring this? Anyway, what I ain't got is a financial shaman to inspect Gartmore's employees. Can you imagine the state their auras are in, and chakras? I need someone to do an assessment. (Not me, Lloyd. You employ hundreds of shamans and mystics. I'm sure you'll find someone.) There's no one like you, Mike. (You don't need me for this job.) Okay, Mikey, it's cards on the table time. I f**king miss you, kid. (Lloyd -) No, listen, I'm going to pay you so much money that you won't want to write those half-assed songs of yours. You ain't gonna be no Burt f**king Bacharach. Come to your senses! You're the world's foremost financial shaman. (Lloyd, it's called independence, you understand? I write these songs, then I don't have to work for you, for Bobby, for anyone. I can upgrade my blog, make it professional, and pay for billboards.) Billboards? (Yeah, billboards. All over the City of London. And Wall Street. Pictures of me, like Doctor T. J. Eckleburg.) Eckleburg? Who the f**k is that ****? You see, this is where you're going wrong, Mikey. I ain't ever heard of no Doctor T. J. Eckleburg, and no one will hear of you. (It's a literary reference. It's symbolic. You don't read a lot of books, do you, Lloyd?) Books?! Books?! Are you out of your f**king mind?! You think I got rich reading books?! (Lloyd -) You gotta get your head straight, boy. Books! I've never heard anything like it!'
The man's a total philistine.
