So, it’s day two of the festival and we are all looking forward to the unveiling of the winners this evening and the party on the beach afterwards.

Monsieur Lavoie, chair and owner of Taxi – the first Canadian jury chair, if you can believe that! – will be leading the Radio charge, with aplomb I am sure. My boss Laura Desmond will be doing the same for Media and someone else – not sure who – will be doing the same for Outdoor.

Word on the street is that both the Media and Radio juries were great and really got down to the business of finding and rewarding exceptional work. Laura is especially proud of the Best of Show, which I can’t wait to see.

The parties start this evening, but even before the presentation and gala opening, Facebook is kicking off the festivities with a beach cocktail party to warm things up. AOL is throwing an event at Le Rooftop, with a special live guest. Le Rooftop seems to be the place this year – with the Association of Quebec Advertising Agencies (AAPQ) having an event there last night and SMG doing the same with the Microsoft/SMG TED conference people the night before.

Just before cocktails we have two fabulous must-see conferences this afternoon – the highly attended and anticipated Contagious/Publicis conference followed by a thought-provoking session from Yahoo!. Cannes has really strengthened the event with stimulating sessions like these.

Need to get home to rest!

Lauren Richards is the CEO of Starcom MediaVest Group in Canada. This is her second year blogging for MiC from Cannes: you can read her 2009 entries here and here.