Ancient mosaic depicts Bible hero Samson

A glittering mosaic of colored stones once decorated an ancient synagogue floor with scenes of the biblical hero Samson getting revenge on the Philistines.

This newly excavated discovery in the ancient Jewish village of Huqoq not only depicts an unusual scene ? Samson tying torches to foxes' tails in order to burn his enemies' crops ? it's also remarkably high-quality, said dig archaeologist Jodi Magness of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.

In a mosaic, "the smaller the cubes, the finer the work," Magness told LiveScience. "Our cubes are very small and fine."

The mosaic decorates part of a synagogue dating back to about A.D. 400 to 500. So far, Magness and her team have excavated only part of the eastern wall of the structure, so they don't yet know how big the synagogue was. But the building appears to be made of large, "beautifully cut" blocks of stone, Magness said, suggesting an expansive structure. [ Gallery: Ancient Israeli Treasures ]

The mosaic, which is incomplete, depicts several scenes. In one, two female faces flank a Hebrew inscription about rewards for people who perform good deeds. In the other, Samson, of the biblical story Samson and Delilah, ties torches to pairs of foxes, an event described in the Book of Judges in both the Christian and Hebrew Bibles. As the story goes, Samson falls in love with a woman of Philistine origin, a people who ruled the city-states of Gaza, Askelon, Ashdod, Ekron and Gath in the ancient Middle East. The Philistines are depicted as enemies of the Israelis in the Bible.

At his wedding feast with his Philistine bride, Samson taunts the Philistine groomsmen with a riddle they cannot possibly answer. When his bride begs Samson for the solution and passes it on to her kinsmen, he kills 30 men from Askelon in a rage. When he returns home, he finds that his bride has been given to someone else. In revenge, Samson gathers pairs of foxes and ties their tails together with torches between them. He then looses 300 of the animals on the Philistines' fields, destroying their crops.

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It's this scene that is depicted in the mosaic. It's an "unusual" subject, Magness said, because only two other synagogues have been found that depict Samson at all, much less a fiery scene of revenge. But one of the other ancient synagogues that does depict Samson is only a few miles from the newly excavated building, Magness said.

"It suggests that, for whatever reason, Samson was popular in the local area," she said.

The synagogue would have been the only house of worship in the village, Magness said. For a village synagogue, it's very fancy, suggesting that the village was an affluent place. That's interesting, Magness said, because the area was under the rule of Byzantine Christians at the time the synagogue was in use. Usually, this is seen as a time of oppression for Jewish peoples, but it seems that the residents of this particular village were doing well.

The archaeologists uncovered the mosaic last week. A student on his first dig was carefully scraping away at the dirt with a hoe when he felt the hard surface of the mosaic. He called Magness over, and they carefully excavated, brushing away dirt to reveal a colorful female face staring back at them, exposed to the light of day for the first time in 1,500 years.

"I think that was probably by far the most exciting moment I've had as an archaeologist in my life," Magness said.

Follow Stephanie Pappas on Twitter @sipappas ? or LiveScience @livescience.? We're also on Facebook and Google+.

? 2012 LiveScience.com. All rights reserved.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48047819/ns/technology_and_science-science/

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Stocks face questions entering 2nd half of '12

By Angela Moon, Reuters

NEW YORK -- U.S. stocks finished the first half of the year with a bang as investors welcomed news that the euro zone is a step closer to solving its 30-month-long debt crisis. Now for the question: Is this rally strong enough to last for more than a day?

The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq posted their best daily percentage gains since December on Friday after an agreement by European leaders to stabilize the region's troubled banks, a pact that helped remove some of the uncertainty that has plagued markets.

"That is the major question. Can this fuel a longer-term rally? It can, but only to some degree if, over the weekend and the course of next week, we don't see any major push back or headlines that suggest that this deal is not going to happen," said Quincy Krosby, a market strategist at Prudential Financial.

"But I don't think this is a major game changer. I do, however, think that this is really the first time we got a relatively immediate answer to what they (the euro-zone leaders) are going to do about the issue."

Under pressure to prevent a catastrophic breakup of their single currency, euro-zone leaders agreed on Friday to let their rescue fund inject aid directly into stricken banks starting next year and intervene in bond markets to support troubled member-states.

They also pledged to create a single banking supervisor for euro-zone banks based around the European Central Bank in a landmark first step toward a European banking union that could help shore up struggling member Spain.

Wall Street's previous reaction to euro-zone bailout packages or other rescue plans had been somewhat muted. Initial gains would quickly disappear by the day's end as investors realized that there isn't a quick fix to the region's problems.?

On Friday, it was a different story. The three major U.S. stock indexes jumped 1.5 percent to 2 percent shortly after the opening bell on news of the euro-zone agreement.

By the close, stocks ended at session highs with the major indexes up between 2 percent and 3 percent. The Dow Jones industrial average surged 277.83 points, or 2.20 percent, to end at 12,880.09. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index jumped 33.12 points, or 2.49 percent, to finish at 1,362.16. And the Nasdaq Composite Index shot up 85.56 points, or 3.00 percent, to close at 2,935.05.

For the week, the Dow rose 1.9 percent, the S&P 500 advanced 2 percent and the Nasdaq gained 1.5 percent.

For the month, the Dow added 3.9 percent, the S&P 500 rose 4 percent and the Nasdaq climbed 3.8 percent.

But for the second quarter, the Dow dropped 2.5 percent, the S&P 500 slid 3.3 percent and the Nasdaq lost 5.1 percent.

Despite the weak second quarter, the three major U.S. stock indexes wrapped up the first half of the year with decent gains: The Dow was up 5.4 percent, the S&P 500 was up 8.3 percent and the Nasdaq was up 12.7 percent.

"The next question is whether the ESM/EFSF will have enough capital and assuming they don't, will the ECB chip in by giving it a bank license, thus leveraging its size. That is yet to be determined," said Peter Boockvar, an equity strategist at Miller Tabak & Co in New York.

"For now, party on and turn that hourglass over as more time has been bought. But only the symptoms are being fought as the underlying disease of excessive debt and lack of growth still remains."

The leaders of the 17 European Union countries agreed on a series of short-term steps to shore up their monetary union and bring down the borrowing costs of Spain and Italy, seen as too big to bail out.

To that end, the euro zone's temporary European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) and permanent European Stability Mechanism (ESM) rescue funds will be used "in a flexible and efficient manner in order to stabilize markets" to support countries that comply with EU budget policy recommendations, a joint statement said.

Any market reaction to further developments this week could be exaggerated by lighter-than-usual volume. Wall Street trading desks may be more sparsely populated because it will be a short week. The U.S. stock market will be closed on Wednesday, the Fourth of July, in observance of Independence Day.

The market's focus will shift to the European Central Bank this week as investors wait to see whether it cuts interest rates to complement the measures taken by EU leaders to shore up banks and bring down borrowing costs for Spain and Italy.?

Most economists polled by Reuters expect the ECB to cut borrowing costs on Thursday, July 5, at its meeting, which takes place against a darkening economic backdrop.

But internal resistance to the central bank reviving its bond-buying program remains high. The ECB has already loosened its collateral rules to make it easier for banks in Spain to access its funds.

"Investors have to be cautious because the market may be getting ahead of itself. We really don't have any details. The big question is still what direction the ECB takes" this week, said Omer Esiner, chief market analyst at Commonwealth Foreign Exchange in Washington.

"It's (the EU deal) certainly not a silver bullet for the debt crisis, but the market is kind of acting like it is. It may set us up for another push down in the weeks ahead."

Stocks had enjoyed a run earlier this month on hopes that global central banks would announce additional measures to stimulate economic growth, which has been tepid.

On June 20, the Federal Reserve extended its "Operation Twist" program to sell short-term securities and buy longer-term ones to keep long-term borrowing costs down. But investors were disappointed when U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, who spoke at a news conference after the Fed's two-day policy meeting, gave few hints that further monetary stimulus was imminent, denting hopes of cheap money in the equities market.

European bond yields will be closely watched this week. Madrid will auction three-year, four-year and 10-year bonds at a primary auction on Thursday in another big test for Spanish yields that are still not far below 7 percent.

France will sell between 7 billion and 8 billion euros in long-term bonds on Thursday.

This week's data includes the Institute for Supply Management's U.S. manufacturing index and construction spending on Monday, followed by factory orders and June car sales on Tuesday.

After Wednesday's holiday, investors will face a blitz of economic indicators. On Thursday, weekly jobless claims and mortgage data, ADP's private-sector payrolls report and the ISM's U.S. services-sector index will be released.

On Friday, the government's June nonfarm payrolls report will come out. Economists polled by Reuters have forecast a gain of 90,000 jobs, with the U.S. unemployment rate holding steady at 8.2 percent.?

Below, CNBC's Tyler Mathisen looks ahead to what are likely to be next week's top business and financial stories.

More money and business news:

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Copyright 2011 Thomson Reuters. Click for restrictions.

Source: http://bottomline.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/07/01/12508970-2nd-half-of-year-shapes-up-as-big-question-for-stocks?lite

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Character Histories

Vampires. Lycans. Shape Shifters. The centuries old feud is leading up to the final battle. Whose side are you on? (ACCEPTING CHARACTERS.)

Owner:

Game Masters:

Topic Tags:

Forum for completely Out of Character (OOC) discussion, based around whatever is happening In Character (IC). Discuss plans, storylines, and events; Recruit for your roleplaying game, or find a GM for your playergroup.
Well, considering that all of our characters are going to be in the hundreds except for some of the Lycans, I figured that some of them have probably met before if not in short or endeaved meetings.

So, this thread is for players to decide how their characters may or may not already know one another and conspire a past between them for resentment or other things etc.

Enjoy!!

Lolkatlove

Member for 1 years

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Aziel - Coven Leader shall know the soon to be created Shifters Alpha. They have a Frenemies relationship though most dont know that since they havent lived long enough to witness their encounters. So most of their arguments will seem deadly to unknown eyes, yet really both of them would shrug an argument off after some brewding.

:D

AS CONFERRED WITH KEITA

Lolkatlove

Member for 1 years

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Post a reply

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Syria violence kills 53, regime troops storm Douma: NGO

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Source: http://news.yahoo.com/syria-violence-kills-25-douma-besieged-005808810.html

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Six die amid severe heat, storms

A procession of violent storms hammered the Washington area late Friday, cutting off power to nearly 2 million people and killing a northern Virginia woman when a tree fell on her house.

The storms hit Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia on Friday night following a day of high temperatures across much of the country. Officials in Tennessee and Missouri were looking into the deaths of five people -- including a baby and two young children -- thought to have been caused by the heat.

West Virginia Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin declared a state of emergency after more than 500,000 customers in 27 counties were without power.

"The damage from today's storms is widespread and in many places severe," Tomblin said.

"With temperatures near 100 degrees expected this weekend, it's critical that we get people's power back on as soon as possible," he added. "We're committing 100 percent of our state's resources for as long as we need to get this cleaned up."

As of 11:25 p.m., Pepco reported 226,012 outages in Montgomery County, Md., 133,160 in Prince George's County and 66,684 in Washington, according to NBC News.

Fairfax County police spokeswoman Mary Ann Jennings told The Associated Press that a woman in the Springfield, Va., area was killed during the height of the storm. Authorities were at the scene of the home but weren't able to immediately get inside, she said.

Jennings also said police were responding elsewhere to reports of a park police officer injured when his car was hit by a tree and an 18-year-old man struck by a downed power line.

The heat wave smothered the central U.S. on Friday spread east -- and for Washington, D.C., that meant topping out at 104 degrees at Reagan National Airport around 5 p.m. ET.

Dead boys had played outside
Heat is suspected to have been the cause of the deaths of two young brothers in eastern Tennessee, Reuters reported. The boys, aged 3 and 5, had been playing outside Thursday. The younger boy died Thursday, and the older boy on Friday afternoon, according to Eric Blach, administrator for the Bradley County Medical Examiner's Office.

In Kansas City, Missouri, city health officials said Friday they were investigating the deaths of three area residents, including a baby boy, to determine if they were heat-related, according to Reuters.

Earlier in the week, a 39-year-old construction worker died at the University of Arkansas.

The nation's capital broke the June 29 record mark by 3 degrees and, with the humidity, it felt like 112, the National Weather Service reported.

The old record of 101 degrees stood for 138 years. Washington's all-time record is 106.

Nashville, Tenn., saw 109 degrees on Friday -- smashing its 60-year record by two degrees.

Triple-digit temperatures across the Mid-Atlantic were expected to break records elsewhere as well, the weather service reported earlier.

Record-breaking heat will continue into the weekend and possibly through the July 4th holiday, it added, "and overnight lows will struggle to drop below 70."

Much of the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast on Friday joined areas in the Plains and Midwest with excessive heat warnings and heat advisories. The Northeast was only slightly cooler.

High humidity could make it feel like 119 degrees in some Carolina coastal areas by Saturday afternoon, the weather service stated.

On Thursday, Norton, Kan., was the hottest spot in the nation, topping out at 118 degrees, according to the National Climatic Data Center. In all, 22 Kansas locations reached 110 or hotter on Thursday.

Over the previous five days, another Kansas town, Hill City, held that hottest spot, reaching 115 degrees on Wednesday.

Story: Heat hub for US is Kansas farm town -- not Death Valley

In Kansas City, Mo., the heat was suspected of contributing to the deaths of a man and an infant, KSHB-TV reported.

Meteorologists expect little relief over the next couple of weeks.

"This overall pattern looks like it is going to stick around well into July," Alex Sosnowski, a meteorologist with AccuWeather.com, told Reuters.

Story: One dead, 347 homes destroyed in Colo. wildfire

"It looks pretty much rock solid centered on the Central Plains and Central Rockies over into the Tennessee Valley interior south," Sosnowski said. "It's anchored in there and it's really not going to change much."

Sosnowski said temperatures would spike toward 100 degrees from Chicago to Washington, D.C., and possibly New York every now and then, and areas from Colorado to the interior of the Carolinas would have little hope for temporary relief.

More than 1,000 temperature records broken in a week

Temperatures will push 90 degrees most days in New York, Washington and Philadelphia the next two weeks, while Denver, Kansas City and the middle of the nation will tend to see high temperatures pushing 100 degrees, he said.

The dry conditions and high temperatures have exacerbated wildfires in western states, and have threatened corn crops and stressed livestock in the Central Plains.

? 2012 msnbc.com Reprints

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/48012442/ns/weather/

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94% Moonrise Kingdom

Containing Wes Anderson's unique touch of heavy handed direction, the only things that allow "Moonrise Kingdom" to somewhat elude the extreme quirky detachment (customary in overrated films such as "The Royal Tenenbaums") is the heartwarming central story concerning two children in love and, in fact, some rather visually stimulating direction. In Anderson's seventh feature film with writer/director credits (this particular film was also co-written by Roman Copploa) he tells the story of two elementary school age lovers, Suzy and Sam (superbly played by Kara Hayward and Jared Gilman) who run away together after finding life with their families insufferable. There is also a parallel (and very misguided) storyline which concerns Suzy's mother and father, played by Frances McDormand and Billy Murray, a Scout Master, played by Edward Norton, and a Police Captain (Captain Sharp) who is played by Bruce Willis, all in search of the two missing children as a storm furiously approaches. Allow me to say this before I get into the meat of my review: while "Moonrise Kingdom" contains Anderson's quirky for quirky's sake storytelling, this film is more like "Rushmore" (undeniably Anderson's crowning achievement) than any of his other films, simply because of its central, child driven storyline. In saying that, "Moonrise Kingdom" does have major flaws. So, if you should hear from any other "critics" that this is "the best film of the year" (because many critics are saying just that) they are wrong. "Moonrise Kingdom" (as an entire film) is just OK. Side Note: OK, so before I get any hateful e-mails proclaiming how my feelings towards "Moonrise Kingdom" directly coincides with my perception of how most of Anderson's work is overrated, art-house fanboy fodder, don't hit send just quite yet. Read my reasoning's below, and then you can decide for yourself. One could go so far as to say that "Moonrise Kingdom" is a tale of two films: one containing an intriguing storyline following two children and their perception of true love, and the other a distracting and rather boring storyline which follows a group of mundane adult characters. So, suffice to say, when Anderson chooses to focus on the children's story, the film becomes rather endearing, but when the lens moves back towards the shrug inducing adult storyline, the entire film seems to stop dead in its tracks, as the audiences is forced to wade through mounds of his eccentric visuals and characters with Diablo Cody-esque (emotionless) speech patterns. So, other than the children's storyline (thankfully the main storyline) some very interesting direction and a fabulous score, everything else here is pretty forgettable, especially all of the adult actors and actresses; and that is a head shaking disappointment when one considers the talent involved. I mean, every adult here does a decent job, but the script fails all of them miserably and persistently. Murray and McDormand are pretty much wasted here, given nothing really to do, and Harvey Keitel is horrendously miscast as the Scout Commander. Ed Norton plays maybe the most interesting character as a kind of pathetic man-boy Scout Master, but said character's potential is exhausted little more than half way through. As for Willis, he plays the Captain Sharp character with a reserved tone that many will confuse as subtlety brilliant acting, when in reality it is a performance that comes off as really kind of dull. Not to say Willis isn't a very good actor, the fact is (and I will say this over and over again) that really none of the adult characters are interesting (or have anything interesting to say) AT ALL; hence what they do and how well of a performance these A-list actors attempted to give is irrelevant here. Anderson's directing is what it is; an acquired taste some might say. As far as "Moonrise Kingdom" is concerned, his direction here is rather genius (for the most part). Near the end there are some questionable uses of cornball CGI, but other than that (as a whole) this is one of the best LOOKING films of the year. Again, it is the storyline (and portion of the dialogue), not the visuals (no matter how overbearing) that fail this film. Final Thought: Maybe there was a larger conceptual thing going on here that I totally missed. Maybe all of those annoying little interludes by Bob Balaban (Ghost World), who plays a narrator of sorts, were meant to be seen as a kind of omnipotent look at the lives of simple people. Or maybe this was a story attempting to define love, ruined by Anderson's fetish for writing stories full of detached adult characters. Overall, "Moonrise Kingdom" can be categorized as having an effectively romantic central storyline, while still containing major, eye rolling flaws that will be unavoidably evident to the non-hipster (non-film geek) communities; aka 90 percent of audiences. Written by Markus Robinson, Edited by Nicole I. Ashland Follow me on Twitter @moviesmarkus

June 29, 2012

Source: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/moonrise_kingdom/

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Animal shelters overloaded in summer, but adoptions also go up

Animal shelters receive more animals during the summer at the same time losing money and volunteers. On the bright side, adoptions generally go up as families spend more time at home.

By Sue Manning,?Associated Press / June 29, 2012

Summer at animal shelters across the country means more animals but fewer staff and donations. Here, Friends for Life Summer Camp volunteers, from left, Mandy Mckimmy, 12, Daniela Evans, 11, and Casey Hahn, 12, play with a Chihuahua mix female dog at the spcaLA P.D. Pitchford Companion Animal Village & Education Center in Long Beach, Calif.

Damian Dovarganes/AP

Enlarge

Summer at animal shelters across the country means more animals, more work, more bills and more worries.

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And there are sometimes fewer staffers, volunteers and donations to handle it.

At the majority of animal shelters in the country, kittens make up problem Nos. 1 through 10 every summer, said Dr. Kate F. Hurley, director of the Koret Shelter Medicine Program at the University of California at Davis Center for Companion Animal Health.

"Kitten season" starts in the spring and ends in the fall in most parts of the country ? a single unspayed female cat can have up to two litters of four or more kittens each.

The Albuquerque Animal Welfare Department gets hundreds of kittens during the summer, but it "feels like millions," said director Barbara Bruin.

"People are more likely to get a dog fixed than a cat, more likely to microchip a dog than a cat and more likely to claim a dog than a cat. Cats are the throwaways and we end up with way too many litters," she said.

Many kittens die because they are brought in so young they have to be bottle-fed and there aren't enough hands, she said. Disease in younger kittens also takes a toll. "We lose a lot of kittens this time of year," Bruin said.

Yolo County Animal Services in Woodland, near the university, normally takes in about 150 cats a month. From May to October, though, that number jumps to 300, Hurley said. The Dumb Friends League, which operates shelters in Colorado, had 350 to 400 cats in February but 751 on June 1, said spokesman Chris Gallegos.

Adding to the population explosion at shelters are puppy litters, runaway dogs (kids leave doors and gates open), dogs hit by cars and dogs rescued from hot cars.

In the past, shelters in college towns would have a rush of abandoned pets when school let out, but that's been changing in recent years, Hurley said. There are a few owners who will dump their pets so they can go on vacation, but with that kind of owner, the pets are probably better off, Bruin said.

Extra animals don't mean more room, more staff or more money, Hurley said. "It's a huge challenge and it comes at the same time a lot of us think about our vacations."

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/r2USOHXBzoo/Animal-shelters-overloaded-in-summer-but-adoptions-also-go-up

miracle andy whitfield kennedy demi moore roy oswalt kevin martin 2012 senior bowl