July 24, 2007 — I want Sumner Redstone to adopt me.

Really, I promise to keep my room clean and take out the garbage, although I assume that “daddy” already has people to do that sort of stuff.

Career counselors will tell you that when you are applying for any job - especially an unusual one like this with the odd-togenarian head of Viacom - you always need to show willingness to accept responsibility.

So, yeah, I’ll do the garbage and even cut the lawn at the estate whenever Sumner’s regular landscapers are unavailable (which I hope will never, ever happen.)

Hedges? No problem for this 54-year old.

Probably more important is that I promise to never defy daddy on the board of any of his companies.

I presume I’ll be given a seat on one or more boards of directors once the adoption is complete.

From that moment on I will be the lackey director that every chairman/father of a Fortune 500 company longs for.

I’ll be known as Mr. Bobblehead - “Yes, dad!” “You’re right dad!” “Perfect, dad!”

In case you don’t know what the heck I’m talking about (or think I’ve finally flipped my flapjacks) there have been loads of stories in the business papers last week about how Sumner, (a wonderful man, I must add) and his ungrateful 53-year old daughter Shari have become estranged.

(See, I’m already sucking up.)

The story was broken on the Fortune magazine Web site by my friend and former colleague, Tim Arango, but was pilfered and published as its own by that temple of journalism, Dow Jones.

But that’s a whole different story and right now I’m just trying to find myself a good home.

The 84-year old Sumner was already on the outs with his son Brent, who owns 17 percent of National Amusements, a company our daddy controls. >PAGE 1>

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 24th, 2007 at 9:00 pm While Dave was in Money. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.