US comedian and talk show host Ellen DeGeneres married her long-time partner, actress Portia de Rossi, at their home in Los Angeles on Saturday, according to People.
DeGeneres, 50, and de Rossi, 35, exchanged handwritten vows in an intimate ceremony attending by 19 guests, a representative for the couple told the magazine.
The couple have been dating for about four years and have been open about their relationship, appearing at red carpet events in Hollywood together.
DeGeneres announced her plans to wed de Rossi, the former Ally McBeal actress, on her talk show, The Ellen DeGeneres Show, in May after California’s Supreme Court overturned a state ban on same-sex marriage.
Irish folk legend Ronnie Drew, a founding member of The Dubliners, died in a Dublin hospital on Saturday, his family said. He was 73 and had been suffering from throat cancer.
The Dubliners, formed in 1962, were pioneers for Irish folk music across Europe and the US. Drew was known for his gravelly-voiced renditions of rabble-rousing folk songs like Finnegan’s Wake and Dicey Reilly.
In a statement, Drew’s family said he died peacefully while they were at his bedside and they were “very grateful for all the letters of support and wishes during the term of Ronnie’s illness.”
With his health failing, Irish music stars released a tribute song in February entitled The Ballad of Ronnie Drew. Proceeds went to the Irish Cancer Society.
Those involved included U2, Bob Geldof, Sinead O’Connor, Andrea Corr, Chris de Burgh, Ronan Keating, Shane MacGowan, The Chieftains and The Dubliners.
Dorival Caymmi, one of the founders of modern Brazilian music, passed away Saturday from multiple organ failure, surrounded by family and friends at his Rio de Janeiro home, at 94 years of age, local press reported.
“We’ve lost the greatest professors of life,” said singer Tom Ze, who like Caymmi hails from the central coastal state of Bahia, where the sun-drenched lifestyle of fishing villages and sultry women inspired Caymmi’s more than 50 lifetime music albums.
From his first and immediately popular song written at 16, O que a baiana tem?, Caymmi’s rhythmic style and deep, sultry voice were adopted by Bossa Nova singers and performed by Joao Gilberto, Tom Jobim and other greats.
An indefatigable worker, Caymmi gave his last performance and cut his last record on his 90th birthday four years ago.
Booze-fuelled Oasis guitarist Noel Gallagher compared troubled singer Amy Winehouse to a “destitute horse” in a stinging rant on his fellow musicians Friday.
The surly loudmouth, known for his scathing outbursts, hit out during an interview on BBC Radio One.
The 41-year-old rocker, who was infuriated by New York rapper Jay-Z headlining the Glastonbury Festival, compared soul diva Winehouse, 24, to a “destitute horse.”
Mark Ronson, who remixed The Zutons’ track Valerie for Winehouse and the Kaiser Chiefs’ tune Oh My God for singer Lily Allen, also came under fire.
“He wants to write his own tunes instead of ruining everyone else’s,” Gallagher said.
“Mark Ronson needs to learn three chords on the guitar and write a tune.”
He branded pop band Scouting For Girls “Scouting For Idiots” and attacked the Kaiser Chiefs, saying: “The Monkees haven’t split up, they’re just going under the name of the Kaiser Chiefs.
“I did drugs for 18 years and I never got that bad as to say, ‘You know what? I think the Kaiser Chiefs are brilliant.’
“Anybody whose drummer writes the songs are not to be trusted.”
Songwriter Gallagher also compared British celebrity Jade Goody’s scent to “stale urine” and suggested Live Aid supremo Bob Geldof’s daughter Peaches should be stamped on.
Goody, a former contestant on British television’s Big Brother, is in India, reportedly to appear in a similar reality show hosted by Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty, whom she was accused of racially taunting on the British version.
Gallagher joked about putting out his own aftershave, Eau de Toerag, “for the working class gentlemen.”
He said Goody’s scent “smells like stale urine, and that’s not the perfume.”
Of Geldof’s newly-married daughter, he said: “God almighty, I have respect for Sir Bob ... stamp on her though.”
Gallagher admitted he was drunk and had had only two hours’ sleep.
A BBC spokesman told the Daily Mail newspaper: “Noel Gallagher was very clearly briefed in advance and monitored during the live interview.
“We have not received any complaints.
“As ever, Noel was a lively and opinionated guest. Of course Radio One does not condone drug abuse and if we felt our guest was drunk we would not put him on air.”
Anyone who has been to Alishan (阿里山) is familiar with the railroad there: one line comes up from Chiayi City past the sacred tree site, while another line goes up to the sunrise viewing platform at Zhushan (祝山). Of course, as a center of logging operations for over 60 years, Alishan did have more rail lines in the past. Are any of these still around? Are they easily accessible? Are they worth visiting? The answer to all three of these questions is emphatically: Yes! One of these lines ran from Alishan all the way up to the base of Jade Mountain. Its
The only geopolitical certainty is that massive change is coming. Three macro trends are only just starting to accelerate, forming a very disruptive background to an already unsettled future. One is that technological transformations exponentially more consequential and rapid than anything prior are in their infancy, and will play out like several simultaneous industrial revolutions. ROBOT REVOLUTION It is still early days, but impacts are starting to be felt. Just yesterday, this line appeared in an article: “To meet demands at Foxconn, factory planners are building physical AI-powered robotic factories with Omniverse and NVIDIA AI.” In other words, they used AI
Last month historian Stephen Wertheim of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace published an opinion piece in the New York Times with suggestions for an “America First” foreign policy for Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris. Of course China and Taiwan received a mention. “Under presidents Trump and Biden,” Wertheim contends, “the world’s top two powers have descended into open rivalry, with tensions over Taiwan coming to the fore.” After complaining that Washington is militarizing the Taiwan issue, he argues that “In truth, Beijing has long proved willing to tolerate the island’s self-rule so long as Taiwan does not declare independence
Nov. 25 to Dec. 1 The Dutch had a choice: join the indigenous Siraya of Sinkan Village (in today’s Tainan) on a headhunting mission or risk losing them as believers. Missionaries George Candidus and Robert Junius relayed their request to the Dutch governor, emphasizing that if they aided the Sinkan, the news would spread and more local inhabitants would be willing to embrace Christianity. Led by Nicolaes Couckebacker, chief factor of the trading post in Formosa, the party set out in December 1630 south toward the Makatao village of Tampsui (by today’s Gaoping River in Pingtung County), whose warriors had taken the
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