So, as I wrote yesterday, I screwed up my camera settings and took all yesterday's photos at the smallest, lowest-quality JPEG settings, which leaves little room to correct white balance and exposure in Lightroom. I did much better the first day.

I'll probably try one more time tonight, but for what it's worth, here are some of the shots from last night, recovered as best I could, presented for the story they tell more than for their photographic qualities...

This worker (manning a large set of trash cans) chatted with me a bit about my lens, and I told him [...]

So I went out to the second (of three) Gion Festival festival-in-the-streets evenings as I did yesterday, but this time I neglected to adjust the camera settings, and I left them at what Anthony uses for his stop-motion Lego play. That means that instead of shooting raw as I normally do, which allows for the highest quality results, I ended up shooting in the smallest, lowest-quality JPEGs the camera could do. What a huge mistake.

It's all the more depressing because I must have given my contact info to at least a dozen people, to contact me for copies of [...]

This is the season for the Gion Matsuri festival, and tonight was the first of three evenings when a lot of streets around Shijo Karasuma are closed off for pedestrian traffic. The streets fill with folks (and photographers) enjoying a festive atmosphere..

I was shocked to see the photo above when I came home and checked out my pictures, because it makes it look much more crowded than it actually was. I hear that tomorrow and the next evening will be so crowded that it'll be difficult to move, but this evening was nothing but pleasant.

People come out for [...]

So the other day I cooked dinner, a stir-fry with various separate ingredients that I intended to bind together by simmering in tomato sauce. However, I hadn't paid enough attention to what I had on hand, and the can of tomato sauce turned out to be a can of cut tomatoes in water. The result was a fairly bland soppy mess.

Each ingredient (wieners, broccoli, bacon, tofu, eringi mushrooms, shiitake mushrooms, the tomatoes, etc.) tasted okay on its own, but it felt disconnected and haphazard, and overall was a disappointment. As we ate I explained to 8½-year-old Anthony what my [...]
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Anthony's cousin Nao (七音), a little healthy girl, was born on Monday to his Aunt Namiko and Uncle Shogo (Uncle Shogo being Anthony's mommy's brother), about nine months nineteen hours after they exchanged vows. All are doing well.

Anthony felt that she was heavy, because, it turns out, that he felt the weight of responsibility in holding someone so tiny. As for me, used to lugging around an eight year old, Nao felt about as heavy as a helium-filled balloon.