Arts as Astra

I applied for an awful lot of faculty positions last year. So it's perhaps not too surprising that I often find myself introducing myself to someone at a conference who happens to have been on a search committee, and he/she says something along the lines of, "oh yes, I remember your application from last year."

Is that a good sign? A bad sign? I always find myself at a loss for words, because I really want to say, "so, why didn't I make your short list?" but that seems like bad form.

I suppose I should look at these things in a positive light, and see it as achieving some amount of name recognition. But I just can't help being cynical.