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sense of self-worth is morbidly wrapped up in your financial success, you probably believe you deserve everything you get. You take it as a reflection of something grand inside you. You acquire gravitas and project it like a cologne
“Those who say don’t know, and those who know don’t say.”
“The fuckin’ frogs are getting their faces ripped off,”
His world was filled with copulating inanimate objects and people getting their faces ripped off.
I didn’t like them one bit, but that was probably a point in their favor. Their presence was a sign of the health of the firm, just as mine was a sign of the illness. If the mortgage traders left Salomon, I figured, we’d had it. There would be nothing remaining but a bunch of nice guys.
They expected, they said, for him to forget about trading for a moment and consider the importance of loyalty to the firm. And you know what he said to that? He said, “You want loyalty, hire a cocker spaniel.”
Early in the day there was trading. I heard the Brooklyn screams of a dozen men at once. “Yo, Joey!” “Hey, Alfy!” “Whaddya doin’, Mel!” “George Balducci, youse can buy twenty-five thousand Phones [AT&T shares] at a half.”
It was striking how little control we had of events, particularly in view of how assiduously we cultivated the appearance of being in charge by smoking big cigars and saying fuck all the time.
