Woman receives master’s degree at age 89!

Joan Donovan, 89, had a private graduation ceremony outside her Florida home to celebrate her master’s degree in creative writing from Southern New Hampshire University.

Donovan graduated high school at 16, but her family didn’t have the money to send her to college. She took some post-graduate courses at her local high school, but stopped after she got married and started a family.

Donovan went back to school to earn her associate’s degree after her children moved away, graduating with a bachelor’s degree from a four-year university at age 84.

She wanted to earn her master’s in creative writing, but her college didn’t offer a programme, so she enrolled in SNHU’s online programme. Donovan said, “Try things. If you fail, try it again ... but just keep trying.”

38 hair ties removed from cat’s stomach

The Char­leston Animal Society said a cat, named Juliet, was brought in by a member of the public after the feline had been left outside a home when the former residents moved out of state.

Carers noticed Juliet was becoming lethargic and was not eating after a couple weeks, and a radiograph discovered she had an unusual blockage in her stomach.

The surgical team treating her was stunned to discover the blockage was 38 hair ties swallowed by the cat! Juliet is now recovering, but the blockage led to a liver condition that is now being treated.

Unusual lost and found items in a hotel chain

The hotel chain Travelodge, which operates 580 hotels in Britain, revealed some of the most unusual items to pass through its lost and found offices in 2022, included a pair of puppies named JLo and Ben, and a Liverpool Football Club-themed wedding cake at a location the wedding’s best man had been staying.

Some other unusual items to be reunited with their owners included a pair of donkeys named Daisy and Duke, keys to a Sunseeker Hawk 38 power boat, an oil painting of Queen Elizabeth II, a matching pair of Segway scooters, a four-foot-tall model gingerbread man, a seagull and a six-foot-long Longwu Chinese dragon.

Scientists reveal secrets of frog transparency

Northern glass frogs in South and Central Ame­rica have the rare ability to turn on and off their nearly transparent appearance, researchers report in the journal Science.

During the day, these nocturnal frogs sleep by hanging underneath tree leaves. Their delicate, greenish transparent forms render them almost invisible to predators. But when the frogs wake up and hop around, they take on an opaque reddish-brown colour.

Using light and ultrasound imaging technology, the researchers discovered the secret: while asleep, the frogs concentrate, or ‘hide’, nearly 90% of their red blood cells in their liver. Because they have transparent skin and other tissues, it’s the blood circulating that gives them away. They also shrink and pack together most of their internal organs.

Only a few animals, mostly ocean dwellers, are naturally transparent, but the trick of hiding blood while sleeping appears to be unique to the frogs.

Published in Dawn, Young World, January 14th, 2023