Seven hundred dollars later and I'm heading to the Toronto International Film Festival.

A conversation with a friend who was home from Toronto prompted me to throw down. He has a place in Hogtown and our friend who's returning from China will be there, so I had to venture up at some point over the next few months anyway. Plus, I had no real other use for the money – I'm making too little to plan for the future, with thoughts of cars and apartments and eskimos. Instead, it's just a steady income that lets me head out to dinner or buy books now and then; it keeps me going. Had I not blown it all on a vacation, I would have wasted it on beer, fast food, and trinkets.

The festival should be ridiculously fun, but I'm not too stoked by the lineup yet. Yes, I do want to see Big Bang Love: Juvenile A and Taxidermia and The Wind That Shakes The Barley and Pan's Labyrinth. But, I'm still hoping for something small to explode into something big, like Capote and Whale Rider did. Who knows, maybe I'll be surprised – they haven't released the schedule yet, and they may be saving the craziest stuff for last.

Plans for the 12 days I'm up there include eating bologna sandwiches, drinking a pitcher a day with Steve and Justin, sleeping on a floor, asking out Natalie Portman, watching three flicks a day in theatres and even more back at the ranch. September 7 - 16, the lights go down...