Talk about people not in touch with themselves: this guy was unaware that he had shot a nail into his brain:
- A dentist found the source of the toothache Patrick Lawler was complaining about on the roof of his mouth: a four-inch nail the construction worker had unknowingly embedded in his skull six days earlier.
A nail gun backfired on Lawler, 23, on Jan. 6 while working in Breckenridge, a ski resort town in the central Colorado mountains. The tool sent a nail into a piece of wood nearby, but Lawler didn't realize a second nail had shot through his mouth, said his sister, Lisa Metcalse.
Following the accident, Lawler had what he thought was a minor toothache and blurry vision. On Wednesday, after painkillers and ice didn't ease the pain, he went to a dental office where his wife, Katerina, works.
....He was taken to a suburban Denver hospital, where he underwent a four-hour surgery. The nail had plunged 1 1/2 inches into his brain, barely missing his right eye, Metcalse said.
"This is the second one we've seen in this hospital where the person was injured by the nail gun and didn't actually realize the nail had been imbedded in their skull," neurosurgeon Sean Markey told KUSA-TV in Denver. "But it's a pretty rare injury." [AP]
Rare, but not rare enough. I too had a nail stuck in my head, though a nail gun was not involved.
When I was 4 or 5 I was playing in our backyard in San Pedro with the two girls from next door. I remember very vividly the strong, almost painfully bright sun reflecting off the bits of quartz in the gravel that made up the pit for our swing set/slide apparatus. After sliding down the slide I was circling back to go again when the younger of the sisters accidentally tripped me.
Article comments
1 - Jim Carruthers
This story isn't that surprising since the success of "Baby With A Nail-Gun" on "America's Stupidest Home Video".
2 - Eric Olsen
"a nail gun in every hand that now holds a rattle" - I like it