Well, at least it hadn’t by the time I left. After the successful, sold-out opening night screening of DC Shorts, ticketholders—all ticketholders, from the entire weekend—were invited to mingle with filmmakers at an afterparty at Drinx in the Verizon Center complex. Free Stella Artois, one of the sponsors of the fest, high-class hors d’oeuvres, and live music from Washington’s own Omega Band ensured the revelers kept on reveling.

Best of all, you could sign up to win all sorts of City Paper stuff! Or just use our setup as an extra-large bar table, which is eventually what happened. (Flipping through the newest issue, by the way, seems to be a great conversation starter, if you know what I mean.)

But back to the event we all came here for. One viewer commented that he thought Thursday’s shorts were “much better than they used to be.” Overwhelming favorites of the night were Douglas Horn‘s romantic comedy, Full Disclosure (“I laughed the whole time,” said Valerie Ianello, director of Saturday night’s IV Courses), and Zachary Brewster-Geisz‘s animated film, The Cell-Phone. (See Q&A with Brewster-Geisz below.)

So don’t wait to buy tickets—the selections may seem unlimited, but the seats ain’t.