SIFF, day 20! It barely feels over two million years ago that all of this sweet celluloid madness began. And what joy! Last night we were back in the warm embrace of our dear old Egyptian Theater, freshly plucked from the brink of oblivion by benevolent SIFF-ly fingers, and I am proud to report that the damn seats are hard as ever. (Butt rub please, stat!) Sadly, the bar they say they’re planning to open to complement the space is still a misty dream living somewhere in the future, but my liver isn’t complaining. The rest of me really is though. Believe it.

I don’t mind admitting that unless they throw one hell of a remarkable Opening Night party (this year’s seemed to be the utter zenith and nadir of “meh”), SIFF’s ever so gay, gay, GAY mid-festival “Gay-La” (geddit?!) most often turns out to be my favorite of all their yearly dos, for reasons passing understanding, of course. (Hush that sassy mouth-hole, you). This year’s was no different!

For some reason they always insist on showing, like, a MOVIE before the big party (so strange) and this one was the world premiere of a truly delightful and earnest little gem called Helicopter Mom about a possibly gay boy and his two shirts. The boy was played by the very adorable Jason Dolley, the shirts were played by London Underground and blue plaid, the crazy mom was brilliantly played by Nia Vardalos from My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Lisa Loeb played an English teacher (my God the '90s were a long time ago), the evil wife of the hot chorus teacher on Glee played an equally evil PTA mom.

OH! And Mark Boone Junior (you’d recognize him, he’s in everything) was one of my favorite characters as the hard-drinking rocker dad. But he didn’t show up for the premiere. Probably because, you know, no bar. In fact, almost none of the cast did a whole lot of showing up, beyond very adorable Jason Dolley, who was the very adorable lead and the best thing about the film, so that was nice. I didn’t hesitate to throw myself at him at the party and promptly spill wine on him. You know. As I do. (To you, Biggie!)

And the party! It was held at Q Nightclub, which brought up the most obvious question of the night, WHY, God, WHY? I spoke with some SIFFters who confirmed my suspicions: they just didn’t realize that Q is the Benedict Arnold of (formerly) queer clubs. (They clearly aren’t reading enough Homosexual Agenda. Ahem.)

Be that as it may, the so-relieved-to-finally-have-a-cocktail crowd didn’t seem to mind or notice one bit, and the rubberneckers were properly rubbernecking as the film’s lovely director Salome Breziner held court in an Alexander McQueen wrap with little cute skulls all over it and a very-Seattle knit-cap. “Everything I wear is Alexander McQueen, I LOVE him!” she said before totally agreeing with me that eyeglasses and shoes are everything, and if you don’t have good pairs of those you might as well be wearing a garbage bag. We danced a little, we laughed, we cried (not really), we scoped out the chicks (well, she did), and we’re totally besties for life now. For realz. (Call me!)

And so! Another year's Gay-La has come and gone, and a mere three days is all the remains between us and the sad end of SIFF 2014. I shall weep copiously, I’m sure of it. So keep your little eyes peeled for my sure-to-be epic Closing Night red carpet report! There better be a god damned bar. That’s all I’m saying.