Near my home 08

It was Tuesday again and walking by the small shrine on my way to the bus stop, I realized that I had not shown you this garish sign that identifies it. It says the name is the Takadama Jinja (tall jewel shrine). Takadama is the name of this area and includes my apartment building. The small print at the top seems to identify the Shinto sect that the shrine is affiliated with, but I am not sure. One thing about living in Japan for a long time, one gets very comfortable with ambiguity and not knowing. This next picture shows a sign that apparently gives the history of this little shrine, but the characters are very hard to read because of weathering, so I am not really sure about the content at all.
Behind the shrine is something else that I realized that I did not show in my previous posting - a playground for the kids. The strange structure in the back with all the posts and no roof is a support for fujii - wisteria. Also notice the statue of a cat that the kids can climb on.
Finally this is the site where they are building the 7/11. There is now a sign out on the main road that says it will open before the end of the year. I am going to try to remember to take a picture every Tuesday so that you can see just how fast this sort of building goes up, even when they do not hurry. I walked by there today (Saturday) without a camera, and noticed the concrete foundation was already poured and hard. There were some workmen there putting in steel rods to reinforce the floor, which I guess will be poured tomorrow or Monday.