Well, this is the 200th newsletter for Ridiculous Opinions. I’ve been doing this thing almost ten years now, off and on, sending the occasional missive to what was originally a group of former students, but has since turned into something larger, with family, friends, and complete strangers taking part. I had planned a big, special newsletter with this 200th issue, but it appears that my brain is a bit fried from the school year, so you’re getting nothing all that great from me this week.

See that picture at the top? That’s a photo from our 5th annual UAE Student Film Festival. I love that picture. It’s so rich with detail and it pretty much captures the magic of what I wanted this film festival to become. It’s pretty wonderful to sit in a movie theater, but it’s even more wonderful to have over 200 people watching something that you created. I’m so proud of my students who made movies for the festival this year (and they should be proud of themselves!). A lot of them have signed up for this newsletter in the last couple of weeks, for as of last night, I saw another group of kids off with their graduation.