Category: Conversation Starters

A patient with ear pain went to the doctor only to discover a lizard had been living inside her head for two days. 

Thai physician Varanya Nganthavee, 25, discovered a gecko inside her patient’s ear on her first day on the job at Rajavithi Hospital in Bangkok on Monday. 

The young doctor was surprised to see something wriggling when she examined her patient’s ear. 

A nurse removed the lizard from the ear with tweezers after Dr Nganthavee treated the area with anaesthetic drops.  

‘This was my last case of the day…. I am so confused. How did a huge gecko crawl into a tiny ear hole?’ Dr Nganthavee captioned a photo of the lizard on Facebook.   

A patient with ear pain went to the doctor only to discover a lizard (pictured) had been living inside her head for two days

Thai physician Varanya Nganthavee (pictured), 25, discovered a gecko inside a patient’s ear on her first day on the job at Rajavithi Hospital in Bangkok on Monday

Dr Nganthavee was worried there were gecko parts left in the ear and took the patient to a specialist ENT doctor on Tuesday. 

‘The doctor confirmed that the ear had been cleared and that no gecko tail remains,’ the newly graduated doctor wrote. 

‘I’m very happy! The doctor complimented me for doing a good job… I could cry.’  

The gecko appeared to be a juvenile small house gecko which are very common in Thailand where they are called Jing Jok. 

How it managed to get into the ear and survive for two days has baffled doctors. 

Dr Nganthavee (pictured) was worried there were gecko parts left in the ear and took the patient to a specialist ENT doctor on Tuesday 

An American tourist has died in a shark attack while snorkeling with her family in the Bahamas, authorities say. Royal Bahamas Police Force Deputy Commissioner Paul Rolle says 21-year-old Jordan Lindsey of Torrance, California, was attacked by three sharks near Rose Island around 2 p.m. Wednesday. The U.S. State Department confirmed to USA TODAY that a U.S. citizen died of her injuries following a shark attack on June 26. KABC-TV says Lindsey’s parents and other family members saw the sharks and yelled a warning but she didn’t hear them in time. Officials say her arms, legs and buttocks were bitten and her right arm was severed.

She was taken to a local hospital, where she was pronounced dead. CBSLA reported that Lindsey is expected to undergo an autopsy in Nassau.

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A Denver dad was so sick that he was booted off his return flight from the Dominican Republic, and has spent the past three days there in critical condition — vomiting, alone and screaming in pain in a hospital bed, his relatives said.

Khalid Adkins became so ill on the trip with his daughter that he wasn’t allowed to fly home Sunday — and has been forced to stay on the embattled Caribbean island, news station KDVR reported.

“He said, ‘They pulled me off the plane and made me go to the hospital,’” his sister-in-law, Marla Strick, told the news station.

Strick said Adkins was “dripping sweat and went to the bathroom to throw up and that’s when they kicked him off the plane.”

His mystery illness comes as dozens of tourists have reported becoming sick on the island, where at least 11 Americans have died in the last year.

Adkins was brought to a hospital in Santo Domingo, where doctors told the family he was in critical condition, according to the news station. His relatives said they haven’t received an official diagnosis, but he’s experiencing kidney failure and having trouble breathing.

“His leg started to swell and that’s why he couldn’t get up. And he started sweating and vomiting,” Strick said. “He is just yelling and in pain, so he couldn’t talk to me.”

The hospital told the family they could try to get him dialysis on the island or he could take a $20,000 medevac flight home.

A GoFundMe page was launched to help try to raise funds to get him back to the US.

“We are trying anything to get him home!” the page said. “It is the most devastating thing ever!! They said we can medivac him home but it is 20,000 we are lost!! It’s a terrible nightmare!!”

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WARNING STRONG IMAGES!

The emaciated man from Russia’s remote Republic of Tuva was preserved as ‘tin-can’ food to eat later by a brown bear, say local reports in the region.

A group of local hunters found Alexander after their dogs refused to leave the area of the den.

Their persistent barking pushed the hunters to check inside the lair, where they found a barely-alive man. He was rushed to the local hospital and has been diagnosed with a broken spine and severe emaciation.

Alexander remembers his first name but not his age, and was reportedly in the den for around one month, drinking urine to survive.

He is now in the intenstive care with multiple injuries and rotting skin.

He can move his arms, local hospital doctors said.

Local medics say they cannot explain how the man survived such injuries. Picture: EADily

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A video shows Alexander opening his blue eyes and confirming his first name.

It is as yet unclear if he was a hunter, too, and how his encounter with the bear happened.

He managed to explain that he was attacked and dragged inside the den when he broke his spine.

The attack happened approximately a month ago, Alexander said.

‘The bear preserved me as food for later’, he explained.

A video filmed inside the local hospital shows that the man turned into a ‘speaking mummy’ with his tissues rotting after laying motionless for so long.

Local medics say they cannot explain how the man survived such injuries.

UPDATE:

The story on the bear man was reported by major Russian newspaper Izvestia and news agency EADaily.

But a spokesman at the health ministry in Tyva Republic said: ‘We cannot confirm the case happened in Tuva.

‘It was not registered by the Ministry of Health, the Emergencies Ministry or any other official body (in the region).

‘Most probably, it happened somewhere outside Tuva.’

Speech on the background in the video appears not to be local language Tuvan.

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Throughout the 10 decades of his journey through this world, Fr. Giuseppe got to know no fewer than six saints in person, and shared his memories of them with Fr. Mario Conte, one of his confréres, who wrote about it in 2016 (although another saint has been added to the list since then, with the canonization of Paul VI).

Of the saints he met, three were popes. He met St. John XXIII while he was still the Patriarch of Venice, where Fr. Giuseppe had been assigned to work at the Frari Basilica. He spoke of the saintly pope in an interview in the St. Anthony Messenger: “We knew each other well. He often came to lunch at our convent in Venice.” St. Paul VI and St. John Paul II both visited the Basilica of Saint Anthony in Padua, where Fr. Giuseppe lived for nearly 50 years.

He also met three great Franciscan saints:

St. Leopold Mandic is a Capuchin saint from Croatia, famous as a particularly kind and gentle confessor, and described by Fr. Giuseppe as “a man of great humility, sensitivity towards others, and great wisdom.” Fr. Giuseppe was impressed by the time they spent together: “He used to come to the Basilica every Wednesday. He would first pay his respects to St. Antony at the Tomb, and then head straight for the confessional, where he used to administer the sacrament for hours on end.”

St. Maximilian Kolbe is a well-known martyr of Nazi Germany, killed in the concentration camp in Auschwitz. Since he was also a Franciscan, Fr. Giuseppe and he crossed paths on various occasions. Fr. Giuseppe described one of those encounters: “He had just returned from Japan, and was very sad because of a humiliation he had experienced there. Despite this he still had great faith and a great love for Our Lady. It was Maximilian who encouraged me to make a vow to Our Lady: that of giving up smoking, and from that day I quit forever.”

Perhaps the most famous of the Franciscan saints that Fr. Giuseppe met is St. Padre Pio of Pietrelcina. Fr. Giuseppe met him during World War II, while serving as the pastor of a church in Sabaudia in central Italy. He developed a personal relationship with the saint, to whom he went for confession. Fr. Giuseppe said, “I remember that I once took his hands and kissed them, asking if the stigmata were painful, and he replied, ‘Well, God didn’t give them to me as an enjoyment!’”

Might Fr. Giuseppe end up being recognized as a saint as well?

He certainly worked hard enough; at the age of 99, he continued to wake up every day at 3:30 a.m. for prayer and adoration, followed by celebrating Mass and then visiting families in need of spiritual or human assistance, including former convicts. In the words of the saint, “Every man and woman has their own dignity. And it must be defended. And in every person, Jesus is present.”

The mayor of Padua described Fr. Giuseppe in the following terms during the ceremony awarding the friar the seal of the city:

“I was fascinated by him when I met him. During this time when we are all in difficulty humanly speaking, he reminds us that each one of us can be a missionary in his own land; that to do good, we don’t have to rule the world, and that here around us there are so many people who need our help. He tells us that we can do good discreetly and humbly, not because poverty should be hidden like something offensive, but because above all we must respect the dignity of those who experience poverty in their own skin.”

The gentle and devout Franciscan friar left this life on May 22, 2019, five days before celebrating his 100th birthday, but nearly nine months after celebrating 100 years of life, time in the womb included. May he be granted eternity in heaven, where he can intercede for us and inspire us to recognize both the saints around us and those who need us to become saints!

Apple is continuing iOS 12.4 developer and public beta testing with the fifth release coming later today. iOS 12.4 is expected to be the first software update to support Apple Card, the company’s new consumer credit card launching in the US sometime this summer.

Bloomberg reported last week thast Apple has expanded internal Apple Card testing to include retail employees, vastly growing the test group beyond corporate staff. Today’s new beta release and the recent test expansion suggest that Apple Card likely isn’t coming in June, but perhaps a launch sometime next month is being planned.

Apple will also release the fourth watchOS 5.3 developer beta for Apple Watch today, although most developers are likely testing Apple’s major software releases coming later this fall: iOS, iPad, and tvOS 13, watchOS 6, and macOS Catalina.

For more on what’s coming with Apple Card, check out our Apple Card Guide and our latest roundup.

The fossil of a giant sea creature that resembles the Loch Ness Monster has been unearthed in Antarctica.

It took decades for researchers to recover the 70-million-year-old remains of the elasmosaur, which would have weighed as much as 15 tons.

The creature – with a snake-like head, a long neck like a giraffe and a body similar to that of a manatee – lived during the Cretaceous period alongside the dinosaurs.

This 40-ft long elasmosaur – found on a small, desolate island off Antarctica – is believed to be the heaviest of its kind, and it is one of the most complete ancient reptile fossils ever discovered on the southernmost continent.

The aquatic reptile, which had four flippers, was a member of the reptile family elasmosaurid, and the discovery points to a vibrant marine ecosystem just before the mass extinction of dinosaurs.

Researchers believe the creature belongs to the genus Aristonectes, which was considered an outlier to other elasmosaurs because they have shorter necks and a larger skull.

Jose O’Gorman, a paleontologist from Argentina, told National Geographic: “For years it was a mystery … we didn’t know if they were elasmosaurs or not.

“They were some kind of weird plesiosaurs that nobody knew.”

The fossil was discovered on Seymour Island – close to the northern tip of the Antarctic Peninsula – in 1989.

Brutally cold weather and logistics meant that it took years for the fossil to be unearthed.

Researchers could only dig for a few weeks in January and early February every year, and some years they were unable to visit the site at all.

Mr O’Gorman said: “The weather is one of the problems. The weather controls all. Maybe one day you can work, and the next day you cannot because you have a snowstorm.”

When the excavation finished in 2017, much of the skeleton had been recovered.

Mr O’Gorman said the creature’s diet likely included crustaceans and small fish.

The fossil is now being analysed to learn more about the ancient sea reptile.

Plesiosaurs been likened to the Loch Ness Monster and some even believe ‘Nessie’ somehow survived when the dinosaurs became extinct.

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A rare, giant squid made an appearance on camera, delighting scientists who were exploring the deep waters in the Gulf of Mexico for a sighting of the elusive deep-sea creature.

Researchers working with NOAA’s Office of Ocean Exploration and Research spotted the giant squid just 100 miles off the coast of New Orleans on Wednesday. They identified it in video captured by Medusa, an underwater camera system that features a lighting system designed to mimic a bioluminescent jellyfish.

The expedition was part of the NOAA Journey into Midnight mission, which is investigating deep, dark areas of the Gulf of Mexico below 3,800 feet, known as the bathypelagic (midnight) zone.

“We knew immediately that it was a squid. It was also big, but because it was coming straight at the camera, it was impossible to tell exactly how big. But big – at least 3 to 3.7 meters (10 to 12 feet) long,” Duke University Professor Sonke Johnsen and Ocean Research & Conservation Association CEO Edie Widder said in a blog post.

Squid expert Michael Vecchione at the NOAA National Marine Fisheries Services – National Systematics Laboratory at the Smithsonian later said that he was “nearly certain” that the creature filmed was a juvenile giant squid.

Footage released by NOAA shows the giant squid approaching Medusa, its tentacles flaring as though it had mistaken the camera for an actual jellyfish and was preparing to attack.

After beginning to wrap its tentacles around Medusa, the squid appeared to have realized that something was not right and disappeared back into the dark depths of the ocean.

Researchers of the NOAA Journey into Midnight mission gather around to watch the squid video. (Photo Credit: Courtesy of Danté Fenolio)

The scientists said previous submersible dives had failed to film giant squid in the Gulf of Mexico.

“This suggests that the animal does not like the bright lights of ROVs and that stealth monitoring of the sort possible with the Medusa can allow us to see what has never been seen before,” Johnsen and Widder wrote.

In the blog post, the scientists also wrote that the squid was spotted in an area that was often depicted in old maps as containing “monsters” with warnings to sailors in the area.

“We did not find a monster. The giant squid is large and certainly unusual from our human perspective, but if the video shows anything of the animal’s character, it shows an animal surprised by its mistake, backing off after striking at something that at first must have seemed appealing but was obviously not food,” Widder and Johnsen said.

They added: “Our perspective as humans has changed. What were once monsters to be feared are now curious and magnificent creatures that delight. We like to feel that science and exploration has brought about this change, making the world less scary and more wondrous with each new thing we learn.”

Recovering the Medusa camera. (Photo Credit: Courtesy of Dante Fenolio)

The giant squid remains largely a mystery to scientists despite being the biggest invertebrate on Earth, according to National Geographic. The largest of these elusive giants ever found measured 59 feet in length and weighed nearly a ton.

Giant squid, along with their cousin, the colossal squid, have the largest eyes in the animal kingdom, measuring some 10 inches in diameter, National Geographic said.

Their inhospitable deep-sea habitat has made them uniquely difficult to study, and almost everything scientists know about them is from carcasses that have washed up on beaches or been hauled in by fishermen.

But in 2004, researchers in Japan took the first images ever of a live giant squid. And in late 2006, scientists with Japan’s National Science Museum caught and brought to the surface a live 24-foot female giant squid. In 2012, a research team collaborating with the Discovery Channel spotted another giant squid and filmed it in its natural habitat thousands of feet beneath the surface. Now, scientists have filmed the elusive giant squid — and in America’s “backyard,” too.

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