MEDUSA ATTRACTS INVESTORS

This was the headline on page B3 of today’s Chronicle Herald from Halifax, Nova Scotia. Not the snake-haired Gorgon of classical mythology, but Medusa Medical Technologies Inc., a Halifax company best known for their Siren ePCR (electronic patient care reporting) system. Why Medusa? I couldn’t find an explanation, but could it be a visual reference, i.e., many individual strands of information being sent electronically to a single system? Siren also is a classical reference, one of the two or three sweetly-singing but deadly half-bird women who appeared in the stories of both the Argonauts and Odysseus. Orpheus, one of the Argonauts, sang more sweetly and drowned out the Sirens, and Odysseus was tied to the mast of his ship while his men blocked their ears with wax and thus successfully sailed past the Sirens.

Wired for Sound

At a dulcimer festival in Latham, New York on Saturday, 5 March, I was amused to make a classical connection as I was waiting for the open-microphone afternoon concert to begin. The sound folks were setting up multiple microphones and attaching them to the sound board and amplifiers through a box that was sitting on the stage. I walked up to investigate and laughed when I noticed that the brand name on the piece of equipment was the Whirlwind MEDUSA.You can check out the Whirlwind company and see some examples of the Medusa snake here. In this age of so many wireless devices, it is interesting to see a fully wired one that recalls the ancient world. Medusa was a mortal Gorgon, once a beautiful woman, who was greatly transformed as a result of offending the goddess Athena. In her final incarnation Medusa is most famous for having snakes instead of hair on her head and for being so ugly that she turns anything that looks at her into stone. The hero Perseus slays her and cuts off her head. From drops of her blood the winged horse Pegasus is said to have sprung. More about Pegasus soon.

Medusa at the Racetrack

Last Sunday my husband and I went to the vintage car show at Lime Rock Race Track in Lime Rock, CT. I love old cars, especially sports cars, but also touring cars. Truly the Jaguar E-type is the most beautiful, a quintessential sports car, and there were plenty on view. But I was really delighted by a Ford circa 1922, a picture of which is above. I wandered all round it, inspecting all the details of construction, and as I was about to walk away, I noticed the name painted on the hood, just above the number 29. Can you see it in the photo? (The glare makes it hard to read without a magnifying glass!) It reads "Medusa." Now, why would an early motor car be named Medusa, the former beauty turned Gorgon with snakes for hair? I have an idea, but I invite your speculations.