Into, Out of, The Blue

Well, my previous entry was all about young writers at the TINA festival. I had fun but the social side was a bit sad. I just don't think I'm cut out to hang out with avant garde wordsmiths because I'm just not cool enough.

The opposite happened last week when I went to a conference in Hobart. Not only did men outnumber women 4 to 1 (that's my guesstimate, it might have been more), most of them were quite a bit older than me so I was considered somewhat exotic.

As a result, I had an excellent time down south and, believe it or not, cannot wait for next year's conference! It also meant that I could observe my readership at close range and gather ideas for the next few issues.

The surprise element was getting to know one guy (who I've met before) on a more personal level. I shall call him Fry for reasons only known to my esoteric brain. Prior to the conference I never really appreciated Fry's work talents or social quirks and then suddenly there he was, this brand new person to whom I'd never opened my eyes.

I then spent the evening meeting with a couple of guys on the bow of the pre-dinner cruise ship, fighting the cold wind together. One was from Townsville, thus unaccustomed to the low temperature, and the other one was from Melbourne so perfectly at home with it.

Unfortunately, neither were on my table at the dinner but there was a spot of eye candy sitting across from me, very clean cut, classically handsome and beautifully dressed (I later learned he was one of the keynote speakers for the next day) - ooh caliente!

The next day I ran into Mr Melbourne at the last keynote speech and we exchanged business cards, which was more of a formality than a particular wish to see him again (on my part, anyway) as I was cut by the news that not only did Fry have a girlfriend, she was travelling with him at the conference.

However, waiting at Hobart airport, I ran into Mr Melbourne again. He seemed keen to talk to me (I should add that there were no direct flights back to Sydney; my itinerary read Hobart-Melbourne, Melbourne-Sydney) but we found out we weren't sitting anywhere near each other. I was down the back so I said he should wait until the plane loaded up because there might be seats near me.

The plane took off and then I saw him looking around for me. There was a seat next to me but it took me about five minutes to decide whether I wanted him to come up. As most people who know me personally know, I have a tendency to attract all sorts of freaks on all sorts of transport (did I ever tell you the one about the Elder and Sister of the Latter Day Saints on a plane to NZ?).

Anyway, I figured, it was only an hour's flight so I waved to him and he came up and I chatted to him for an hour. It was nice. Sure, he invited me to go skinny dipping in his front yard the next time I happened to be in Melbourne but apart from that it was all very pleasant and I actually wouldn't mind seeing him again. Too bad about the great distance between us.

Okay then, so just this week gone I spoke to Fry over the phone trying to get some info for the mag from him (a legit call, I was not trying to manufacture anything though the fact that I'm being defensive says something, doesn't it?) and I mentioned that I heard that his girlfriend was the person going around taking all the photos of everyone at the dinner and said that I thought they were just as good as the professional photos. He then said that it wasn't his girlfriend, it was his ex-girlfriend and they were just travelling together.

What am I supposed to think now? I really like him but he's technically a client and I don't know enough about him to know whether I should pursue something or just let things grow organically (or not, as it were). I have, to my misfortune, reached a point of fascination and it has all come out of the blue.

[P.S: I had a feeling that by the end of this entry I would resort to calling myself either hormonal or boy crazy but I've surprisingly been quite measured this last week, so measured, in fact, that I didn't throw myself at Felix Riebl when I went to his sustainability session. Just as well - I found out he has a girlfriend. I like Ryan, anyway.]