Nikon D4 + Voigtländer 125mm f/2.5 — ¹/320 sec, f/5.6, ISO 5000 — map & image data — nearby photos
Coming and Going
entrance to the Jojuji Temple, Kyoto Japan
December, 2012
浄住寺(京都市嵐山）、2012年12月

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A couple of weeks ago during a scooter ride around western Kyoto, I came across a temple that I recalled having visited a couple of years ago. Its entrance path is quite nice.

Here's how it looked two weeks ago:

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 120mm — ¹/250 sec, f/2.8, ISO 220 — map & image data — nearby photos
October 9th, 2014
二週間前（2014年10月9日)

I'll have to visit again in a month when the colors are hitting their peak, but until then, here are some more views from Dec 1, 2012:

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 50mm f/1.4 — ¹/640 sec, f/1.4, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos

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Nikon D4 + Nikkor 50mm f/1.4 — ¹/320 sec, f/1.4, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos

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Nikon D4 + Nikkor 50mm f/1.4 — ¹/200 sec, f/1.4, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos
Sundrenched
「太陽の降り注ぐ」？

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Nikon D4 + Voigtländer 125mm f/2.5 — ¹/320 sec, f/2.8, ISO 900 — map & image data — nearby photos
Looking Back
門、途中までから

Nikon D4 + Voigtländer 125mm f/2.5 — ¹/320 sec, f/2.8, ISO 1400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Dead Giveaway

The smudge of red reveals who joined me on that visit. It was the same trip two years ago with the intense rainbow over Arashiyama a pretty path, a bunch of whimsical carvings, among others.

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/50 sec, f/2.8, ISO 400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Private Room for Five
at the Hotel Okura's The Garden Okazaki
ホテルオークラの「ザ・ガーデン岡崎」での鉄板焼きランチ
Kyoto Japan

Fumie's folks took us out for lunch the other day, after a morning event to mark the 100th day of Fumie's dad's mom passing during the summer (she was 99½). The meal was teppanyaki at The Garden Okazaki, similar to the exquisite meal at another local hotel that I wrote about in the spring.

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/50 sec, f/11, ISO 2800 — map & image data — nearby photos
Nice View
and we each got a big cloth apron

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 55mm — ¹/125 sec, f/4, ISO 640 — map & image data — nearby photos
First Appetizer
shrimp and various fishes

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 58mm — ¹/125 sec, f/4, ISO 2200 — map & image data — nearby photos
Waiting in the Wings
for later courses

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 36mm — ¹/80 sec, f/2.8, ISO 800 — map & image data — nearby photos
Starting With the Grill

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 48mm — ¹/100 sec, f/2.8, ISO 220 — map & image data — nearby photos
Shrimp Appetizer

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 50mm — ¹/100 sec, f/2.8, ISO 140 — map & image data — nearby photos
With Sauce

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 62mm — ¹/125 sec, f/2.8, ISO 1250 — map & image data — nearby photos
And a Sprig of Green

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 60mm — ¹/125 sec, f/2.8, ISO 560 — map & image data — nearby photos
More Waiting in the Wings

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 55mm — ¹/100 sec, f/4, ISO 6400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Butter
and fish and veggies

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 32mm — ¹/60 sec, f/4, ISO 2500 — map & image data — nearby photos
A Touch of Seasoning

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 70mm — ¹/160 sec, f/4, ISO 800 — map & image data — nearby photos
Layering
rice patty, grilled fish, veggies

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/50 sec, f/2.8, ISO 250 — map & image data — nearby photos
Sauces

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 70mm — ¹/160 sec, f/2.8, ISO 6400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Raw Garlic

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 70mm — ¹/160 sec, f/2.8, ISO 5600 — map & image data — nearby photos
Soon Became Garlic Chips

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 70mm — ¹/160 sec, f/2.8, ISO 1400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Bring on the Beef

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 32mm — ¹/60 sec, f/2.8, ISO 400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Pepper

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/50 sec, f/7.1, ISO 1100 — map & image data — nearby photos
Lunch is Served
my medium-rare steak is done; mediums are still on the grill

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 27mm — ¹/60 sec, f/2.8, ISO 800 — map & image data — nearby photos
Rice and Beef Snippets...

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 34mm — ¹/80 sec, f/2.8, ISO 800 — map & image data — nearby photos
... and Lots of Minced Garlic
made for a very nice garlic rice

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 58mm — ¹/125 sec, f/2.8, ISO 640 — map & image data — nearby photos
Dessert

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 70mm — ¹/160 sec, f/2.8, ISO 1400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Anthony's Milk Tea

So, the big question is whether this one was better than the one before, and we were split, so it's probably that they're quite comparable.

Canon PowerShot S20 @ 6mm — ¹/20 sec, f/2.9, ISO 62 — map & image data — nearby photos
No Poodles Here
(wow, beauty is certainly in the eye of the beholder)
At a gallery in Carmel California, in 2000

A security weakness dubbed “POODLE” has recently been discovered in how internet-connected applications make secure connections, and this is having an increasingly-detrimental impact on Lightroom. Thankfully, it's easy enough to fix for most folks, and this post tells you how.

POODLE manifests itself in that certain kinds of secure connections are no longer quite as secure as they're supposed to be, so until you fix this for your Internet-connected applications, your data may be at risk. But the secondary problem is that, until fixed on your system, your Internet-connected applications like Lightroom may experience seemingly random network errors as more and more remote sites, in an effort to protect their users' data, completely disable support for the insecure protocol.

(A tertiary problem is that folks running into these networking problems while using my Lightroom plugins blame the plugin and inundate me with bug reports.)

How to fix for Mac OS X:

Install Apple's latest security update (which you should be doing anyway). That's it. You're done.

How to fix for Windows:

If you use any of my Lightroom plugins, the easiest way to fix it is to upgrade to the latest version of the plugin. As of versions that I released yesterday, all my plugins do a one-time check to see whether you're vulnerable, and if so, pop up a dialog that offers to fix it for you:

Just click on the [fix now] button and the plugin will fix the problem (disable SSL support in Internet Options, and enable TLS support.).

If you don't use any of my plugins, or if you didn't fix it the one time the dialog (perhaps unexpectedly) popped up, you can use my free my System Information plugin to check/fix your system any time:

The [how to fix] button brings you to the same dialog shown earlier, offering to fix it immediately for you.

In either case, the plugin fixes applications like Internet Explorer and Lightroom that use the base Windows connection library. Some third-party browsers do their own networking, so must be fixed separately. If you have custom browsers on Windows, see this page. (That page also explains how to do the base fix the plugins do, in case you don't want to have the plugins do it for you.)

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 200mm — ¹/400 sec, f/9, ISO 400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Huh?

The other day while scootering around western Kyoto, I paid a visit to something that looked odd in Google Maps, to see what it actually was.

It seemed to be a building of cube rooms...

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 70mm — ¹/200 sec, f/9, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 170mm — ¹/400 sec, f/6.3, ISO 220 — map & image data — nearby photos

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 102mm — ¹/250 sec, f/6.3, ISO 160 — map & image data — nearby photos

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 70mm — ¹/160 sec, f/6.3, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos

It turns out to be an assisted-living nursing home named “Life in Kyoto” (ライフ・イン京都) with 226 units ranging from 350 ft² to 920 ft². It seems a bit pricey to move in... of the four units currently available, the largest is a scant 445 ft², but costs $350,000 for a single person to move in, or $470,000 for a couple. As far as I can tell, that's just a fee... you're not getting any equity.

On top of that, there's a monthly fee of about $1,000/month for a couple, and $650/month per person for meal service (about $21/day for three meals, which seems like a good deal).

You have to be 55 or older to move in. If you're like my grandmother-in-law who passed away this summer at 99, the $350,000 fee to move in at 55 prorates to $8,000 a year. If you move in at 65 and live to 83 (the average life expediency in Japan), that works out to almost $20,000/year. I guess, like everything in life, it's a gamble.

The view is nice... here's a shot from the neighboring building, with Kyoto Tower about 7km (4¼ miles) away:

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 200mm — ¹/400 sec, f/6.3, ISO 160 — map & image data — nearby photos

Not far away, while slowly puttering through a very residential area on the western edge of the city, I came across a tiny park, large enough to accommodate only a few cars were it a parking lot. But it was a park, and it accommodated exactly one 1911-era steam locomotive:

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 70mm — ¹/160 sec, f/5, ISO 1250 — map & image data — nearby photos
Circa 1911 O&K Type C1 Steam Locomotive
at “SL Park” (SL公園), Kyoto Japan

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 70mm — ¹/160 sec, f/10, ISO 450 — map & image data — nearby photos
Information Display
what's left of it

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 70mm — ¹/160 sec, f/2.8, ISO 1250 — map & image data — nearby photos
Inside

This is the unsurprising answer to last week's A Black-on-Black “What am I?” Quiz.

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 70mm — ¹/160 sec, f/2.8, ISO 180 — map & image data — nearby photos
Choo-Choo

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 @ 70mm — ¹/160 sec, f/2.8, ISO 280 — map & image data — nearby photos

Odd to find this tucked away in a fringe residential area. It calls to mind the one-man kamikaze submarine that used to be on display not far away in Arashiyama. Here's a photo of a marble monument that I took seven years ago:

Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 at an effective 72mm — ¹/20 sec, f/5.6, ISO 800 — map & image data — nearby photos
Type 10 Kaiten One-Man Kamikaze Sub

The sub (torpedo really) itself used to actually be on display here in this pretty little garden off on one side of a restaurant, but it was moved to Hiroshima. There was also a crudely-carved painted wooden sign:

Nikon D200 + Nikkor 17-55mm f/2.8 at an effective 25mm — ¹/80 sec, f/5.6, ISO 800 — map & image data — nearby photos

I noted in a blog post in 2011 that the marble plaque had been removed as well.

Anyway, one can certainly come across some odd things in western Kyoto.

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/50 sec, f/13, ISO 1000 — map & image data — nearby photos
Maniden Hall (right) and Main Hall (left)
at the Daishoin Temple (大聖院), Miyajima Japan

During past weekend's trip to Miyajima Island, the impending typhoon brought back memories of my first trip to the island, in 1989 after having been in Japan for only a month. A friend at work (Andy Krantz) had a nice trip planned for the week-long Obon holidays the country takes every August, and kindly invited me along. On this trip we stopped by Miyajima Island, which I knew nothing about (at the time I knew nothing about Japan except Perl Harbor and Sony).

On that visit I certainly would have seen the famous shrine gate, but I don't remember it at all. My only memory of that visit 25+ years ago is of a small gazebo at a temple where one can shake a rope to jingle bells to awaken the gods' attention to your petitions, I guess (as described here). During the visit, we had the island to ourselves because it was nonstop torrential rain... just amazing amounts of water descending from the sky in nonstop torrents. I remember the little gazebo because it provided a short respite from the rain. We shook the rope. It was probably my first visit to a temple of any kind.

So with this memory in mind this past weekend, I wondered where that gazebo was. I don't recall having seen it on any subsequent trip to the island (here and here), so I kept more of an active eye out this time.

Part of my wanderings brought to the Daisho-in Temple, tucked in the mountains 15 minutes from the famous shrine gate. With buildings sprinkled all up the side of a mountain, there are many levels and stairways. Every time I came to the top of a stairway I thought I might find my gazebo, but I reached the top without finding it...

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/400 sec, f/2.8, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos
End of the Trail
furthest area of the Daisho-in Temple

I didn't know it at the time, but it turns out that my gazebo is in front of the hall at right in the photo above. Descending back down to where the stairs to the hall starts...

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/50 sec, f/3.5, ISO 125 — map & image data — nearby photos
Prayer Wheels (摩尼車)
steps leading to Daishoin Temple's Maniden Hall (大聖院の摩尼殿)

The idea is that you spin them as you go by, as the person in the photo above is doing. According to the note written down the first support for the wheels, it's believed that spinning a wheel once around provides the same benefits as reading one scroll of sutras. Whatever that means.

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/60 sec, f/2.8, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/50 sec, f/2.8, ISO 180 — map & image data — nearby photos

At the top of the stairs is Maniden Hall, fronted by a gazebo with the rope and bells...

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/60 sec, f/2.8, ISO 100 — map & image data — nearby photos
Revisiting After 25 Years

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/50 sec, f/2.8, ISO 400 — map & image data — nearby photos
I Remember This Scene

I seem to remember more distance between the gazebo and the building proper, but it was immediately clear that this is the place I remembered. I was happy to have found it.

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 26mm — ¹/50 sec, f/2.8, ISO 280 — map & image data — nearby photos
Looking Back

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 44mm — ¹/100 sec, f/4, ISO 5600 — map & image data — nearby photos
Detailed Carvings

I don't recall the Hall itself on that trip 25 years ago. It was probably shuttered up for the storm. Peeking inside this time...

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/40 sec, f/5.6, ISO 6400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Ready for a Crowd

Following the veranda down the side and to the back, you come to a red-velvet steep stairway...

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/6 sec, f/5.6, ISO 6400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Steep Stairway

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/25 sec, f/2.8, ISO 6400 — map & image data — nearby photos
Twisty

It leads to the upper level of the two-story pagoda, which was mostly empty...

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/50 sec, f/2.8, ISO 1000 — map & image data — nearby photos
Table for Two

The ceiling was pretty, though less symmetrical than I would have imagined...

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/50 sec, f/5, ISO 5600 — map & image data — nearby photos
Remarkably Unsymmetrical

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/50 sec, f/11, ISO 360 — map & image data — nearby photos
Nice View

You can see the five-story pagoda in the distance.

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/50 sec, f/6.3, ISO 4500 — map & image data — nearby photos
Side Veranda
back on the first floor

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 24mm — ¹/50 sec, f/6.3, ISO 3600 — map & image data — nearby photos
One More Look Inside
the first floor

Nikon D4 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 42mm — ¹/100 sec, f/2.8, ISO 280 — map & image data — nearby photos
Spinning
they're heading up as I'm heading down