Free Republic

Skeletal collections with trauma found from the Neolithic period in Anatolia suggest that injury was caused by daily activities and lifestyle, rather than systematic violence. However, shortly after this period there is an increase in trauma associated with violence that may suggest an increase in stress within and between populations in this area... The human remains come from the site of Titris Hoyuk, dating to 2900-2100 BCE. The site grew very quickly in this period from a small farming community to an urban centre within a large mud-brick fortification wall built over a stone foundation. Within one of the house...

Underwater footage shot whilst scuba diving in the Fiji islands and Tonga. Featuring colorful coral reefs, huge schools of tropical fish, sharks, humpback whales, underwater caves, scuba divers and much more marine life from the south Pacific.

This place gets reviews that range from raves to scowls. I used to love this place in the early eighties. I used to get this plate of korean ribs asian bbq beef and bbq fish with rice for like $5 The loco moco was great too.I was just wondering if anybody else out there had eaten at this dive and what they thought of the place.Millions of military have been served.

Now we know why Hollywood & Broadway liberals love Communism. Lots of job opportunities in "all singing , all dancing musical extravaganzas"! "http://www.wimp.com/ceausescuvisit/"

As much as Foley likes discovering shipwrecks -- he's found or helped find 26 in the past 14 years -- he doesn't much like spending time looking for them, at least not in the conventional ways. Rather than sending dive teams down to survey 1,000-foot transects one fin kick at a time, Foley prefers to use autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) to survey huge tracts of seafloor. Where the robots don't work well, Foley sends down divers armed with closed-circuit rebreathers and thrusters, allowing them to cover more ground. He wants to go faster, he says, because he needs a lot...

HANOI, Vietnam — A mom with a screaming child wanted a quick getaway from a plane on the tarmac in Vietnam and asked for help. The man next to her obliged by opening the emergency exit and triggering the escape slide. ~SNIP~ The man, identified as 29-year-old Le Van Thuan, told authorities the child's mother asked him to open the door so she and the child could exit faster. An airport official says the man will be fined up to $950, and it will cost $10,000 to refit the slide.

Ludovic Masciave, 36, was driving his car through the Arly Gorge in the French Alps when a 20 ton boulder crashed onto the roof of his vehicle. Amazingly, Masciave survived the crash and is recovering in a local hospital, according to Landov...

1 Cruise to northern Norway The Norwegian cruise line Hurtigruten (0844 448 7601, hurtigruten.co.uk) has launched a number of new charter flights in response to a surge in demand. A five-day “Arctic Highlights Voyage”, sailing from Tromsø to Kirkenes and back, costs from £949 per person, including flights, on selected departures in November and December. In addition to time in Tromsø (home to the Arctic Cathedral, Polar Museum and a Polaria Centre containing bearded seals), optional excursions include husky dog sled rides, a visit to North Cape, snowmobiling and a trip to the border post with Russia. There are longer...

Alex Wade had always wanted to surf off Hawaii's north shore. But then he saw the size of the breaks at the Banzai Pipeline.Dave Rastovich, 33, is a professional surfer for the Billabong team. As happens every December, "Rasta" is at Billabong's house on the north shore of the Hawaiian island of Oahu. He's there to bag some serious water time at the many breaks along what is known as "the seven-mile miracle", a series of world-class waves stretching from the hippie town of Haleiwa on the south-west of the north shore to Sunset Beach towards the north-eastern point. Rasta...

But for the glow from the campfire, it is impenetrably dark. Never are there stars, as if that would be too much to hope for. Instead, beyond the rock overhang, it's pouring, waves of water relentlessly slapping the giant fronds of the jungle. It always seems to rain at night here in the mountains of Papua New Guinea. This is why Lidia and what's left of her people, the Meakambut, seek refuge in rock shelters -- they're dry. Located high in the cliffs, sometimes requiring a treacherous climb up vines, caves are also natural fortresses that once protected the Meakambut...

When lead-footed drivers get snagged and ticketed, their downfall might have been passing a speed trap where a cop was using radar or a laser, or maybe the driver passed a speed camera. However, as technology improves traffic enforcement, it is also progressing on the side of the speeder. Now joining the radar detector is crowd-sourced reporting of speed traps, a virtual warning system using the Internet and a mobile app. This list of the 10 most-active cities for speed traps was compiled by Trapster.com, a community platform accessed online and via smartphone app, that alerts drivers to traps, hazards...

The Vikings are both famous and notorious for their liking of beer and mead and archaeologists have discussed for years whether Eric the Red (ca 950-1010) and his followers had to make do without the golden drink when they settled in Greenland around the year 1,000: The climate was mild when they landed, but was it warm enough for growing barley? Researchers from the National Museum in Copenhagen say the answer to the question is 'yes'. In a unique find, they uncovered tiny fragments of charred barley grains in a Viking midden on Greenland. The find is final proof that...

The winter months are ideal for whale sightings as these massive mammals make their 7,000 mile journey from Alaska to Baja, California by way of our Pacific waters. The warm waters to the South are ideal for mating, birthing, and growing in preparation for the long journey back to cooler Alaskan waters. We’re right in the midst of their migration and large numbers of gray, fin, and minke whales have been spotted right off our coast. With record numbers of whales being spotted up and down the coast, now is the ideal time to embark on a whale watching adventure....

For a long time, scientists had assumed a gradual expansion of African people through Sinai into both Europe and Asia. Then, bizarrely, it became clear from both genetics and archaeology that Europe was peopled later (after 40,000 years ago) than Australia (before 50,000 years ago). Meanwhile, the geneticists were beginning to insist that many Africans and all non-Africans shared closely related DNA sequences that originated only after about 70,000-60,000 years ago in Africa. So a new idea was born, sometimes called the "beachcomber express," in which the first ex-Africans were seashore dwellers who spread rapidly around the coast of the...

Imagine you're a 12-year-old girl[or POTUS]. Ponies and clothes are your favourite things. You've just been shopping and you're wearing your new cowboy boots, new jeans, a blue checked shirt and a real cowboy hat. You've had breakfast – blueberry pancakes with crispy bacon, just the way you like them – and now you're walking across a sunlit meadow, filled with gently grazing ponies. You're feeling pretty good. A tall cowboy with a slow drawl asks if you'd care to help him round up the ponies into the corral so you say yes, as casually as you can. The...

The emerging commercial space industry is proving to be an important economic engine in eastern Kern County -- and beyond. But some have worried that the industry's "learning period" could be stalled if a moratorium on federal regulations is allowed to expire at the end of this year. Now it appears that won't happen. Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Bakersfield, the House majority whip, was able to insert a provision in the Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization bill that will extend the moratorium nearly four more years to Oct. 1, 2015. The House is expected to vote on it Friday, a McCarthy spokeswoman...

Has this ever been mentioned on Cable News? Did Obama actually hand GM 50 Billion Dollars to build the Volt? And if so? How many have been sold and how many had to be recalled? The last update so far was that we have spent 250 Thousand on every Volt Sold, and didn't they all get recalled? Kinda like what happened with the Ford Pinto Blowabout? If the math is wrong,please recalculate. But it looks like another 50 Billion went down the tubes,along with Solyndra. You could of fed millions of starving Americans with 50 Billion !!!

NEW YORK — Frequent flier miles aren't so enticing when they're taxable. That may be the sentiment among Citibank customers who are receiving 1099 tax forms from the bank to report their frequent flier miles. The forms were sent to customers who were given American Airline miles for opening a checking or savings account last year. That's causing confusion — and possible concern — among those who never before reported their frequent flier miles and other credit card rewards as income.

I proposed to She Who Must Be Obeyed on Christmas Day, in front of all the usual suspects. So now the marriage machine is in full stroke and I am planning our honeymoon. I think we have settled on a roadtrip through the Appalachians up to Arlington. Probably come back through the FL panhandle, over to Nawlins and back home to Dallas. I have a few thoughts and many questions ...

There are plenty of drumlins in County Down - but have you heard of the Mound of Down? If not, that is probably because it has been hidden from public view by trees and gorse for decades. But work is now under way to expose this fortification which could be about 1,000 years old. Tim Campbell, director of the St Patrick Centre in Downpatrick, said it was one of the largest megalithic hill forts in western Europe. "We have forgotten about it as it been overgrown with trees," he said. "It was the seat of the high kings when they...

"Aegisuchus witmeri or 'Shieldcroc' is the earliest ancestor of our modern crocodiles to be found in Africa," said Casey Holliday, co-researcher and assistant professor of anatomy in the MU School of Medicine. "Along with other discoveries, we are finding that crocodile ancestors are far more diverse than scientists previously realized." Shieldcroc is the newest discovery of crocodile species dating to the Late Cretaceous period, approximately 95 million years ago. This period is part of the Mesozoic Era, which has been referred to as the "Age of the Dinosaurs;" however, numerous recent discoveries have led to some scientists calling the era...

As United Airlines retires its last Boeing 737, the Tribune looks back at some of the aircraft the carrier has used from its start as the nation's first coast-to-coast mail and passenger service.

Survivor: One World is the 24th season of Survivor. It begins Wednesday, February 15, 2012 on CBS at 8/7c. References: Official Survivor site at CBSWikipedia article'Survivor: One World': New cast and new twists revealed! There will be no Redemption Island this season. There will be no returning players this season. As with last season, this season will take place in Upolu, Samoa. Along with Survivor 19 (Samoa) and Survivor 20 (Heroes vs. Villains), this is the fourth season to take place at this location. Both tribes will begin the season by living at the same camp site. The tribes will...

From the wilds of Craigslist, this piece of automotive excellence emerged recently seeking new ownership for the price of an entry-level iPad. Yes, it's a 1992 Geo Metro given a limousine stretch. Yes, there's a mural of Betty Boop with a tiger on the hood. And it has some of the most avant-garde ad copy I've seen...

While a postdoc at Cornell University a few years ago, Adam Boyko became curious about the little-studied village vagrants. Though dogs were first domesticated 20,000 to 15,000 years ago, most breeds go back only a few hundred years. Perhaps village dog DNA might shed light on the long, early history of domestication, when canines were hanging around humans yet not under our domain. But how to get samples? As it happened, around the same time Boyko's brother Ryan had married, and he and wife Corin were looking for a cheap honeymoon off the beaten track. The three Boykos decided to...

For doomsday theorists, Dec. 21, 2012 could mean the end of civilization, according to some interpretations of the Mayan calendar. But for some tour operators and property owners, the end of the world also means a chance to cash in on the apocalypse hype. In the most prominent countries of the Mundo Maya – Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, and parts of Honduras and El Salvador – the tourism industry is gearing up for a record year, with dozens of Maya-themed offerings designed to lure visitors. The Guatemalan city of Tapachula will feature an 8-foot digital count-down clock in its main park,...

A recently discovered mysterious "winged" structure in England, which in the Roman period may have been used as a temple, presents a puzzle for archaeologists, who say the building has no known parallels. Built around 1,800 years ago, the structure was discovered in Norfolk, in eastern England, just to the south of the ancient town of Venta Icenorum. The structure has two wings radiating out from a rectangular room that in turn leads to a central room. "Generally speaking, [during] the Roman Empire people built within a fixed repertoire of architectural forms," said William Bowden, a professor at the University...

(CBS News) A gruesome mass grave found in southern England may be the final resting place of some of the most feared marauders of the 11th century. Archeologists say the remains may belong to Viking mercenaries, who were buried in a burial pit in what now is the English town of Dorset. Isotope testing on the men's teeth links their origin to Scandinavia. That's where the easy clues end.

Foley, a marine archaeologist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, and his colleagues at Greece's Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities in Athens have spent the day diving near the cliffs of the tiny island of Dia in the eastern Mediterranean. They have identified two clusters of pottery dating from the first century BC and fifth century AD. Together with other remains that the team has discovered on the island's submerged slopes, the pots reveal that for centuries Greek, Roman and Byzantine traders used Dia as a refuge during storms, when they couldn't safely reach Crete. It is a nice...

An international team of archeologists, led by Ignacio Clemente, a researcher with the Spanish National Research Council, has discovered and documented an assemblage of fish seines and traps in the Dubna Basin near Moscow that are dated to be more than 7,500 years old. They say that the equipment, among the oldest found in Europe, displays a surprisingly advanced technical complexity. The finds illuminate the role of fishing among European settlements of the early Holocene (about 10,000 years ago), particularly where people did not practice agriculture until just before the advent of the Iron Age. Says Clemente: "Until now, it...

Researchers at the University of Kent have recreated the processes Neanderthals used to produce sharp flint axes, and found that our ancestors were skilled engineers. A modern-day 'flintknapper' replicated the sharpening processes that Neanderthals used to create tools -- a sort of modern 'reverse engineering' of ancient techniques in use by three kinds of early 'hominin' including Neanderthals as early as 300,000 years ago. The researchers found that Neanderthals could shape 'elegant' stone tools -- shaping them to be hard-wearing, easily sharpened and with a perfectly balanced centre of gravity. The reproduction of how Neanderthals worked shows that it is...

What Really Killed Costa Concordia’s Passengers? Captain Schettino has received a lot of criticism in the mainstream press and, possibly, even more from industry insiders including gCaptain for abandoning ship before the last passenger was safe. An important question is not being asked however… would his presence on the bridge have saved lives? The answer is likely no.

Europe’s motorcycle industry is having a tough ride in the current economic times despite being touted as one of the solutions to road congestion and pollution. Sales of motorcycles and similar light vehicles have plummeted in the past five years, from 2.7 million in 2007 to 1.7 million last year, industry figures show, hampering efforts to roll out a new generation of hybrid and electric transport. “The crisis has deeply, deeply affected the European market,” said Hendrik von Keunheim, president of ACEM, the European motorcycle industry trade group. “Many European suppliers are struggling.” The European Commission’s 2011 transportation White Paper...

Scientists believe that two 33,000-year-old skulls unearthed in digs in Siberia and Belgium show dogs were domesticated long before any other animal, such as sheep, cows or goats. Researchers from the University of Arizona said the skulls had shorter snouts and wider jaws than undomesticated animals such as wolves, which use their longer snouts and narrower jaws to help them hunt. That suggested the dogs had been kept for protection and companionship by our ancient ancestors -- just as they are today. The researchers think dogs could have been the first species of animals to be domesticated by humans, long...

BUELLTON, Calif (NNS) -- Seabees from Naval Mobile Construction Battalion (NMCB) 3 and the 31st Seabee Readiness Group (SRG) helped to rescue a family involved in a car wreck on Highway 101 in Buellton, Calif., Jan. 12.

Traveled by Native Americans, presidents, generals, gypsies and families seeking a new life in the west, “The Great Road,” known today as Frederick Road or Route 355, provided a path for both the adventurer and the entrepreneur. As the main route northwest from Georgetown, the last port on the Potomac River, it was heavily traveled from the mid 18th century until it was replaced by Interstate 270 in the 1960s. It began as an Indian trail leading from the Piscataway settlement at the mouth of Rock Creek to the great “Conestoga,” a trail that included footpaths and waterways (what we...

Cruise and Liner History: The offer of a 30 percent discount on future cruises, made by the owners (Micky Arison’s Carnival Corp) of the recently shipwrecked Costa Concordia (Costa Cruises), has been faced with a number of angry responses from passengers of the ill-fated luxury liner.

The cruise ship hitting a rock and tipping over throwing thousands overboard, is pretty much what we have been seeing under the Obama Administration. Think of the cruise ship as the economy and the debt. The cruise ship finally hits that wall and Captain Obama is the first one to bail leaving his economic team to save the passengers. Anyone surprised Chrissy Matthews hasn't compared the Captain to the Tea Party yet? He probably would just like during the mining crisis!

You can probably imagine the kinds of nightmares a teenager on a solo voyage round the world might suffer from: pirate kidnappings, treacherous coral reefs or perhaps scary encounters with mysterious sea creatures. But not Laura Dekker. The 16-year-old schoolgirl's sleep is haunted by memories of the traumatic experiences she suffered at the hands of the Dutch authorities. And ever since she set her sights on sailing round the world she says Dutch social services have done their best to stop her from pursuing her dream. ~~~~ Earlier this month truancy officers issued her father with a summons claiming that...

Palaeoanthropologists now know a great deal about these ice-age Europeans who flourished between 200,000 and 30,000 years ago. We know, for example, that Neanderthals shared about 99.84 per cent of their DNA with us, and that we and they evolved separately for several hundred thousand years. We also know Neanderthal brains were a bit larger than ours and were shaped a bit differently. And we know where they lived, what they ate and how they got it. Skeletal evidence shows that Neanderthal men, women and children led very strenuous lives, preoccupied with hunting large mammals. They often made tactical use...

During the season of 2011, three edges of an unknown manmade feature appeared at 1.80m to the north of KV 40, on the 25th of January, the first day of the Egyptian revolution. Due to the situation, it was immediately covered with an iron door. As this structure is so close to KV 40 and as it was impossible to know whether it was just a short unfinished shaft or a real tomb, we gave it the temporary number 40b. This number is now replaced by the final designation KV 64. The KV numbers should definitely be used exclusively for...

This has cast doubt on the popular theory that Mesopotamian brewers used to crumble flat bread made from barley or emmer into their mash. The so-called "bappir" (Sumerian for "beer bread") is never counted as bread in the administrative texts, but in measuring units, like coarsely ground barley. Damerow also points out that the high degree of standardisation, which meant that the quantities of raw materials allocated to the brewers by the central administration remained exactly the same over long periods, sometimes even decades, makes it difficult to base any recipes on them. According to Damerow, even the "Hymn of...

<p>Which is worse when you’re traveling: the local driver who blithely cuts you off in traffic or the surly cabbie who gives you attitude right to your face?</p> <p>Such skirmishes no doubt fueled this year’s America’s Rudest Cities contest, voted on by Travel + Leisure readers. Three-time-champion Los Angeles, home of road rage, went head-to-head with classically brusque East Coast cities such as Boston, New York and Washington, D.C. — all of which landed in the top five.</p>

It will be, we are confidently promised, the greatest show the Thames has ever seen and perhaps even outshine the Olympics. The Diamond Jubilee river pageant will feature 1,000 boats, 20,000 eager participants and millions of cheering spectators. Details of the spectacular event on June 3 were released yesterday, prompting London Mayor Boris Johnson to predict a ‘glorious’ spectacle which would ‘perhaps be more exciting than the Olympics themselves’. Pageant Master Adrian Evans spoke of ‘a once-in-a-lifetime event, one that will reclaim the Thames as a royal route’. He added: ‘I’m hoping it will be majestic, joyous, uplifting and patriotic...

LA QUINTA (CBS) — Former President Bill Clinton is scheduled to hit the links Saturday in the Humana Challenge golf tournament. The Humana Challenge begins Thursday morning with professionals like Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson, Matt Kuchar and Bill Haas. Celebrity players include singers Smokey Robinson, Alice Cooper, Michael Bolton; actors Morgan Freeman and Don Cheadle and basketball Hall of Famer Julius Erving. The tournament will be played at the La Quinta Country Club and the Palmer and Nicklaus Private Courses at PGA West, and airs live on Golf Channel 12-3 p.m. on Thursday and Friday and 1-4 p.m. on Saturday...

The TSA's performance Do you think TSA agents do a good job? Yes No Not Sure

Israeli metropolis beats New York and Toronto in poll naming best urban destinations for gay travellers Tel Aviv has been named the world's number one gay city. The Israeli metropolis beat out competition from New York to top a survey carried out by American Airlines and GayCities.com to find the most popular destination for gay travellers. It landed a staggering 43 per cent of the vote, way ahead of runner-up New York's 14 per cent and third-placed Toronto with 7 per cent. Sao Paolo came in at four with 6 per cent, while rounding out the top five with 5...

Long gone may be the days when flying was a luxury though the handling of the airport's terminal is believed by one travel site to still make all the difference to its passengers. Travel website Frommer's has released their list of the top 10 best and worst airport terminals in the world.

Railway staff have begun hanging concrete balls above train tracks in Indonesia to try to stop commuters from riding for free on carriage roofs.