sorry i did not plow thru all the posts here but Jared Diamond's new book "the world until yesterday" would be a good read for those with an interest in tradition societies.
the round up is that nothing in life of hunter-gathers that still exist can tell us about prehistory.

I usually bring some lube. You never know when they might run out.

Re: the crystal skull, I was vastly disappointed in the last Indiana Jones movie. Aliens is just not the right kind of story for this series.

true. they went downhill when they went "alien". it was far too cliche. it basically showed that their plot fell apart. that can only happen if they try to "put a plot together on the fly", as opposed to having someone write a proper story from beginning to end. when that happens, it's a dead giveaway that the producer was just after money.

Pete2