2008-08-05. Tuesday. this morning we continued the shovel pass which was started yesterday pm, moving westward across locus 128 from the soil change near the LB wall (locus 126). Locus 128 doesnt contain an especially larhe quantity of materials, but is consistently dark and plastic and fairly easy to dig-- with the exception of the innumerable mid-sized rocks lying within the matrix. on the north side of the trench, within the baulk and floor there is a considerable amount of bioturbation, with both filled (yellow soil) and empty burrows between rocks, etc. A general clean of the rocks in the east end of the trench was also finished today to the level of locus 128, with removable rocks removed. i had thought that perhaps locus 128 was a sort of final deposit hich would directly overlie the northern continuation of locus 107. this may still turn out to be the case, but there are enough large boulders lying below the current level to make progress less than straightforward. this afternoon we finished the first pass, and we will start another tomorrow, pausing periodicall to control the backfill process within the southern trench, pushing stones and soil up agains the base of wall locus 118, and trying to keep the face of locus 113 as clean as possible.