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PMark Security Incident - JIPDEC announces investigation results into Privacy Mark breach
Japan’s “Privacy Mark” system had a serious security breach in Aug 2023, and its operator JIPDEC (Japan Information Technology and Social Promotion Association) announced the results of an investigation into the matter. 🕵🏻♂️
When companies implement P-Mark, there are a number of requirements to be met, similar to what organizations go through when trying for an ISO certification. Reviewers for JIPDEC are responsible for auditing the certification applications, and one such reviewer had saved review documents on an unsecured personal NAS.
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AshidaVox ST-31-02 Headphones Microcast
A companion micro-podcast to go with my AshidaVox ST-31-02 Headphones post. 🎙️
Transcript
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IndexNow Update Script - automate your search engine URL submissions
“IndexNow” is an automatic way to get participating search engines to come search specified URLs your site, and one cool thing about it is if you submit an URL to one, it gets pushed to all. I wanted an easy and automatic way to submit if there are any new URLs on this blog, so I started thinking of a way it could be done. Let me share that with you.
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AshidaVox ST-31-02 Headphones - new wired model for my daily driver
Perhaps ten years ago I bought BeyerDynamic T90 headphones, which I love and which have served me well every single day, but they are just falling apart from wear1, so I was looking for an appropriate replacement. I found new ‘phones from AshidaVox2 with great cost performance that I’ll share in this review from my perspective as an audio layperson. 🎧
Background and Decision-making I’m attracted to wireless headphones and IEMs that connect via Bluetooth, but I have not had good luck with reliability so far, with AirPods or wireless IEM’s of any flavor, so I thought I would look for something good which is also a wired model, for listening to music, podcasts and watching Netflix etc around the home.
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Yamanashi Daibosatsurei Hike Microcast
A companion micro-podcast to go with my Yamanashi Daibosatsurei Hike post. 🎙️
Transcript
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Yamanashi Daibosatsurei Hike - 100 Mountains of Japan
On Saturday 28 Oct 2023, my daughter K and I drove out to Yamanashi prefecture, for a ~10km hike at Mt. Daibosatsu (“Daibosatsurei” 大菩薩嶺 2057m). The hike took about 6 hours, with about 650m of ascent and descent from parking 4 down by the lake. A fantastic day, and the 6 hours of driving was well worth it.
Daibosatsurei Background “Daibosaturei” is one of the “100 Mountains of Japan” (after Kyuya Fukada’s book), located in Yamanashi Prefecture in the Chichibu-Tama-Kai National Park (in the “Kai” part), straddling Koshu City and Kitatsurugun, and feeding the Tama and Fuefuki rivers.
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Ramen Vomit Yakuza Incident Microcast
A companion micro podcast to go with my Ramen Vomit Yakuza Incident post. 🎙️
Transcript
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Ramen Vomit Yakuza Incident
One funny day: I was out with a client near Motomachi Yokohama, at a warehouse that was a prospect for the client’s logistics operations in Japan. The contract was a fairly nice chunk of business, valuing a couple hundred thousand USD per month.
The meeting was a hysterical failure. It was August, super hot and humid as usual for Japan, but the warehouse meeting room had no AC and they insisted we wear construction helmets, and to add insult to injury, would not give us any water.
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Myojingatake Hike Microcast
This is a companion micro podcast for my Myojingatake hike in Hakone on 3 Sept 2023. 🎙️
Transcript
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German Swings Scare Me
German swings scare the bejeezus out of me. Do you know what those are?
When I was a kid in the 1970’s, we used to go to the shore every couple of years, mostly Nags Head, North Carolina. You’d see temporary carnivals here and there, so naturally us kids wanted to ride and we’d beg our parents to let us.
“German swings” are seats attached to or hung from the outer edge of a large rotating disc by chains.
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Hakone Myojingatake Hike - from Saijoji to Miyagino
On Sunday 3 Sept 2023, I did a 6hr solo point-to-point hike in Hakone, ascending 903m up to Myojingatake (明神が岳, 1169m) from Daiyuzan Saijoji Temple (大雄山最乗寺 aka Doryoson), and descending 719m to Miyagino (宮城野) on Rt. 138, traveling over about 9km. From there I took the bus down to Kami-to-no-sawa (上塔ノ沢), then walked to an onsen for a scrub and a soak.
When I hiked up Myojogatake, I had intended to go up Myojingatake as well, but I was tired that day and opted out.
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Old Tokaido Hike in Hakone
On Monday 18 Sept 2023, on Respect-for-the-Aged day, I did a 5hr solo point-to-point hike in Hakone, up the “old Tokaido” and “old Hakone Town” roads, ascending 752m and descending 119m over 10.7km. This was not up a single mountain per se, but was plenty tiring going up a very long slope, as the humidity is still hanging around even in September. The hike started in Hakone Yumoto, then followed the road then trails all the way up to Lake Ashi.
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Tanzawa Oyama Hike
On Sunday 27 August 2023, I challenged myself to an approx 5:45hr 6.8km solo hike in the Tanzawa range on a hot and humid day (it suddenly rained at the end), ascending about 905m up Mt. Oyama starting in the shopping district around 7am, climbing up via the “Onna-zaka” (women’s slope) route to the summit, then descending about 630m down via Miharashidai to the “Shimosha” shrine area, and finally down by cable car.
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Dubner TMSIDK Rocks
The interesting and informative podcast “Tell Me Something I Don’t Know” (TMSIDK) from Stephen Dubner, strikes me as a kind of antidote to “fake news” so common these days. 📣🎙️
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Mt. Myojogatake - Hiking Hakone
On Saturday 12 August 2023, I did an approx 4hr 6.7km solo hike in Hakone on a humid day, ascending about 570m to Mt. Myojogatake (明星ヶ岳 みょうじょうがたけ 923m) from the Miyaginobashi bus stop, heading towards Mt. Myojingatake past the giant kanji cut into the mountain side for the o-bon festival, then down toward the Miyagino Annaijo bus stop.
Mt Myojogatake is one of the stops on the gairin “outer rim” (外輪 がいりん) of Hakone, and you might meet trail runners attempting to complete that brutal course.
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Mt. Sengen and Mt. Takanosu - Hiking Hakone
On Sunday 30 July 2023, I challenged myself with a ~10 km solo day hike in Hakone on a hot summer’s day, ascending the Yusaka trail from Hakone Yumoto station, ascending 850m over about 7km to Mt Sengen 802m (浅間山 せんげんさん) and Mt Takanosu 834m (鷹巣山 たかのすやま) with the (nonexistent) Takanosu Castle ruins, then descending 400m to the highlight, Chisuji Falls (千条の滝 ちすじのたき) at the 8.5km mark, and proceeding another couple of km over roads to Gora.
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Kintoki Hike in Hakone
On Saturday 22 July 2023, I challenged a solo day hike up Mt Kintoki (金時山 きんときさん) in Hakone, on a perfect day for hiking, and was rewarded with incredible views from the summit. This mountain has maybe the best view of Mt Fuji, too. It was a good physical challenge for this 57 yr old who mostly jogs and walks the dog. My legs held up better this time compared to my first adventure up Mt Kurobi in Gunma, probably because I’ve tried to be more active since then, doing several less-challenging hikes in the meantime.
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Nagoe Kiridoshi Hike from Zushi to Kamakura
On Saturday 15th July 2023, I did this solo hike and jog from JR Zushi to JR Kita-Kamakura, via the “Nagoe Kiridoshi” (名越 “Nagoe” place name 切 “Kiri” cut 通 “Doushi” route or way), one of the seven ancient passes cut into the mountains surrounding Kamakura to make it easier for people and horses to pass.
The news said the heat was going to be brutal, so, wanting to be out early, I packed the evening before buying some energy and protein bars at the local supermarket, and was up at 4:30am to get a quick shower and apply sunscreen and insect repellent.
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Kamakura Alps Trek 12km from Kounandai
On Sunday 2nd July 2023, I challenged myself with this ~12km solo hike from JR Kounandai to JR Kamakura, via the Kamakura Ten’en Hiking Trail in the “Kamakura Alps”.
After delivering the pamphets and papers from the chonai meeting the night before to our group’s mailboxes, I set out at about 6:30 am on the scooter, and parked at a 24 hour lot at JR Ofuna. From there, I took the train two stops up the Negishi line to Kounandai, bought a couple of protein bars at the combini, and exited.
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Kurobi Hike in Gunma
On Saturday 3rd June 2023, I had my first real mountain trekking experience. It was fantastic with perfect weather, but I got to discover how out of shape I really am. We went up Mt. Akagi, aka Mt. Kurobi, in Gunma Prefecture; one of the 100 famous mountains of Japan (English) or 百名山 “hyakumeisan”. During the trek, I asked our guide why Akagi’s considered a “beginner mountain”, and she said it’s because there are not many areas where you’d risk death.
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M365 Trial Tenant Trouble
We at my firm eSolia decided to migrate everything to Microsoft M365, for better or worse, because literally all our clients use it and things are just more efficient if it’s our daily driver. However, we had used a production domain in a trial tenant in the past, and this caused a lot of agita.
Besides the tenantname.onmicrosoft.com domain that comes with the service, you can assign a custom domain that you purchase via a registrar in the usual way.
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Scent Hounds Terrible Plight
My wife told me about an awful thing happening in Japan. Some hunters who use “gun dogs” or “scent hounds” to flush out prey, will abandon them in the forest, chained up at the end of the hunting season in early spring, or let them stray, after which they get picked up and taken to a shelter. These people are really scum to be treating an innocent dog so cruelly like that.
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Thirtieth Anniversary Trip to Shimane and Tottori
I can’t believe it’s been 30 years since we got married. To celebrate, we booked a tour of Shimane and Tottori prefectures, and had a fantastic time. We did a tour so we could not have to plan, and drink without worrying about someone having to drive. We took the bullet train from Shin Yokohama to Okayama, then went on the tour bus to Adachi Museum, then to Tamazukuri Onsen for the first night.