The real reason I wrote is to thank you for posting the news about Billy Boyd's attendance of the Medicine Hat Film Festival. Myself and two friends drove the hour and a half from Lethbridge (where we attend University) to go see and hopefully meet Billy. With a twinge of guilt, I must admit that I did not go to the film festival solely to see six Scottish Shorts. But then, the reason Billy is traveling with the films is to promote them and bring people who normally would not care to see short films (such as perhaps myself) out to experience the art. I was pleasantly surprised and enjoyed the films anyway. They were all well done and most of them were quite profound. A well spent $7.

Anyway, when Billy was called up (after the MC called him Billy Elliot by mistake - a good chuckle) he literally pranced up to the mike. He said that he was seeing some of the films for the first time that night as well. After his intro, the MC tripped over a step while returning to the front and fell towards Billy. He made a joke of it and a short little hug ensued. Billy is absolutely hilarious. He doesn't seem to miss any comedic opportunity.

After the shorts (I must mention once again that they were quite good) there was a short question and answer period. He made another little comedic performance when trying to sit on the stage that was at his shoulder height. He made a few fake jumps at it then the MC pushed him up. Quite funny. There were some questions about the Scottish film industry, one about his high budget vs. low budget preference (no preference), some about his film specifically including what drew him to that script (apparently it was the first Sci Fi every filmed in Scotland among other reasons), and one about the games 'Cup' and 'Teg'.

I asked if he and Dom were still working on their script together. He told about how that started (while they were sitting in Treebeard's 'branches' with nothing else to do) and how it's coming along. They finished a first draft and the people they showed it to liked it but wanted to bring writers in on it. He still doesn't know if they're going to do that but right now they're working on a second draft and Dom has it.

After all that there was a little thing down the street at a bar called "Mario's". A little 'rub shoulders with Billy Boyd' thing. The three of us had a nice little chat with him and got pictures of the three of us with him (sadly not digital so I can't share them now). I got my booklet from the FOTR Extended edition signed and one of the friends I was with got her Two Towers book signed somewhere in the chapter where Pippin and Merry are talking to Treebeard. We thanked him for his time and I had a good trip home once I quieted down the two screaming girls.

I would definitely recommend anyone who can to go see Billy and the films in Edmonton or Burlington. He is a very funny and friendly guy and the shorts are awesome too.

Oh, as I was leaving the theatre, a lady asked to take a picture of my 'TheOneRing.net, Top Ten Signs You Are A Tolkien Fan' hoody! That was kind of cool. I thought I would mention that for obvious reasons.

Thank you once again for letting us all know that this was happening as I would have had no idea otherwise and would have been severely disappointed had I found out afterwards. Keep up the quality, informative, and up-to-date work.