Dilemma

I had the honour of speaking here on Saturday. A great day with some great people and even though I sucked at least it was in front of a lot of people in a very fine ballroom. I mean if you must go down in flames.......

Naturally enough I retreated afterwards to a dark ,cave like bar in the bowels of the hotel. There were not many people about and I had the actual bar to myself to commune with Sam Adams and jot down some notes. A piano tuner was torturing a baby-grand in the corner and 'twasn't too much of a hardship to listen to it. Maybe that's why the bar was empty. I have a knack for tuning out things that bother most people and that can be a blessing at times. Sure enough some dapper little man materializes at the bar to complain about the piano-tuner to the bartender. Normally this wanker would fall into the 'things I tune out ' category but not that day.

"For God's sake. It's five o' clock and you tune the piano NOW !"

1. He was a wanker
2. He was whining about someone doing their job
3. He was giving shit to a blameless barman instead of whoever was responsible for the piano-tuning schedule.
4. He didn't have to sit there. There was a large and comfortable lobby for him to be a shit in.
5 He was inside my blast radius.

"Just pretend it's Philip Glass or some other avant-garde stuff" I'd been thinking along those lines when I initially exiled the plinking to the background.

There was some ineffectual mouth flapping at this point that eventually resolved itself into a shaky "Excuse me?"

"It's not his fault. You should take it up with the management."

" I-I wasn't talking to you."

" Funny how I could still hear you then.....over all this noise and all."

Yes folks. I was on my picky right enough.

This results in the barman and I becoming instant comrades and we get chatting. Eventually he gets around to asking what brought me to the hotel and I give him the bare minimum about speaking at an event at the hotel. It's a big venue with a lot going on. Even though the bar was quiet I was hoping to be lost in the crowd. Out of the corner of my eye I spy a very fine young man take a seat at the corner of the bar. We have precisely one half of the bar between us. A not inconsiderable distance. As my new pal goes to serve him I go back to my notebook and scrawl away.

A muted telly was showing baseball and I glanced up to see the football results come in. Ireland's 1-1 draw with Bulgaria got a shrug and a 'meh' from me but it was duly noted by the Fine Young Man. He asks a question that I fail to hear due to distance and my new enemy the piano-tuner. To make this story less tedious I go over to hear what he had to say. He was a bit of football fan and we get into it for a few minutes. My hero the barman sees my new location and ,bless his heart, decides to play Cupid. He moved my drink,notes,pen and bag down next to F.Y.M.

"Siddown you. Dis guy needs to talk to a preddy lady"

Indeed he did. I resolved to send one his way as soon as I found one. In a very strange stroke of luck this fella was attractive,intelligent, funny and single. We talk for ages (at one point advanced mathematics and translating 3-D mapping imagery onto 2-D media made their appearances..as they do) and I sort of tippy toed around the usual chit-chat. This is when being someone like me is a bit shit. Does this guy know? If he doesn't is he blind and/or deaf? Come to think of it why is he here? What do I do next? I had danced around my reason for being here with the barman but even that much evasion was tiring. I truly hate having to be on my guard like that. I haven't had to in some time ( I keep unsociable hours) but it was easy enough to slip back into the vague smokescreen of half answers and mobile truths. I retreated to the toilet to have a bit of a think.

When I return FYM is settling up and preparing to jet. We chat a little more but there is a palpable shift in tone and reserve. It's not as easy as before. Something has happened. We do the ritual email exchange and he leaves. As I finish my drink the barman appears. There is a puzzlement on his face.

'Where did yer boy go?"

"Something spooked him" I reply only half joking.

Crushed into a ball where he was standing was a list of speakers for the event taken from one of the welcome packets.

I guess it was me, being on that list, that did it.