Happy Thanksgiving
Hello assorted Hostages, lurkers, lackeys, hangers-on, cretins and other assorted turkey taints! By now most of the family either has or soon will assemble for one of the most hallowed days of football this year. There’s nothing more heartwarming than Cleveland Browns fans thinking they’re going to the Super Bowl. So grab the clam dip and Ruffles chips and scroll on down to be delighted.
MMM 385: Ba’albek
Etymologically, there’s reason to believe that the city in modern Lebanon (famous for these ruins, and known as Heliopolis to the Greeks and Romans who once built and lived here) is named for the Ba’al of the Old Testament, the competing but false god prayed to by many neighbors of the Israelites. The largest stones in the images below are the massive mastabas upon which the Greeks built their temples to Jupiter and Bacchus, which archaeologists tell us were added much later, though how much later is still up for dispute (dating stonework is harder than, say, skeletal remains). Due to their strategic location in Lebanon, these same temples were used as garrisons and forts during various conflicts, including the Crusades, and there is evidence of “recent” (AD ~1200, iirc) repair to some wall segments by the Moslem forces who used them militarily.
This is known as “The Stone of the Pregnant Woman”. It weighs 1820 tons. No crane, no machines, no diesel fuel, quarried from bedrock and moved at least half a mile (though downhill) to where it now sits, half-sunk in the soil.
Need Sun, Need Warmth
We have had 5 days of rain and cool-ish weather(40’s-50’s) with today being the only day where it might stop raining. I have been promised global warming for years and thought I’d be in the tropics by now. Instead all of my citrus tree starts have died as have the decorative palm trees that line my driveway. My neighbors scoffed at the notion of my equatorial vision but I kept my own counsel, inspired by the prophet Algore. Soon I will build a massive greenhouse over my yard warmed by cow farts and cigar smoke and I will be the laughinest laugher that ever laughed!
What change looks like
The Official Sports Team of The Hostages
Honorary Hostage David Thorne – Epic E-mail Exchange
Get TITS2 & The H2 Stuff
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