Proving screen addiction is good for you, a napping California teen smacks attacking bear with laptop

Medical experts are divided on the existence of “screen addiction,” but whatever caused a napping Southern California teen to keep her laptop within arms reach may have saved her life. A 19-year-old resident of Sierra Madre, Calif. was napping in a chair at her backyard Monday evening when a black bear
suddenly attacked her, scratching at her arms and legs and
biting her, USA Today reports. According to a California Fish and Wildlife captain, the unidentified teen grabbed her laptop and smacked the bear with
it. “She managed to break free of the bear enough to
run back inside,” the CFAW captain, Patrick Foy, tells the outlet, which verified that the teen sustained minor injuries to
her arms and legs, none of which are life-threatening.

Located about 20 miles northeast of Los Angeles, Sierra Madre is in the foothills of the San Gabriel Valley, where black bear sightings are common but unprovoked attacks are not. Foy says Monday’s attack was “100 percent unprovoked” and the teen was right to fight back. “The recommendation to play dead is in the incident of grizzly bears,” he explains.