Thursday, November 20, 2008



Sometimes, a gal's just gotta take charge.
Hedy Lamarr and Spencer Tracy in Tortilla Flat

From IMDB:

Hedy's credited invention was for a radio guiding system for torpedoes which was used in WWII. She supposedly gained the knowledge from her first husband, Fritz Mandl, a Viennese munitions dealer who sided with the Nazis. Hedy drugged her maid to escape her husband and homeland.

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I generally have a goal of kicking more of the week's ass than it kicks of mine. At this point, I'm thinking I'm only still ahead of the game because I took Tuesday off.

8 comments:

Joe Allen said...

Even more amazing; Ms. Lamarr's invention is the foundation of spread spectrum technology - the basis of modern cellular and wi-fi technology!

Beauty and brains, far ahead of her time!

Joe

Anonymous said...

That's HEADLEY!

Did not know about the torpedo; only knew about the frequency-hopping comm system.

Carteach said...

Ha! Took off on Monday (part two), did you? That's cheating!

Considered doing that myself (g).

Our second marking period is half over as of Friday.... the year is flying past with amazing speed. In a few days... Thanksgiving.... and a couple days of bliss. That energizes me more than anything else in the world.

Thud said...

My sister vinogirl had a bull terrier called hedy...not too flattering it would seem but we are lamarr fans..honest!

NotClauswitz said...

Heddy is short for Heidi (or just semi-mispronounced the first "i" is silent) which is short for Hedwig - not great but better than Waltraude any day! Austrians familiarize words and names by adding -erl to them, it's kind of a diminutive and "cute" form, like even calling a big guy named Heinz Heinzerl is like calling him "shorty" - or something, more useless trivia...but the best fresh Semmels in the world, or "Kaiser Rolls" as they are called here. Bla-bla-bla, sorry! :-)

Barbara Bruederlin said...

I did not know that! Fascinating story!

Taking Tuesday off is always the wise choice. They call it stormy Monday, you know, but Tuesday's just as bad...

Old NFO said...

We still use that technology in the military today, it's called Have Quick.

Vinogirl said...

Ah yes, my dearly departed Hedy Lamarr, I love that dog to this day. It was actually Thud that came up with the suggestion I name my poochie that...we were always Hedy fans :)