Ozzy Osbourne, the gloomy, demon-invoking lead singer of the pioneering band Black Sabbath who became the throaty, growling voice — and drug-and-alcohol ravaged id — of heavy metal, died Tuesday, just weeks after his farewell show. He was 76.

“It is with more sadness than mere words can convey that we have to report that our beloved Ozzy Osbourne has passed away this morning. He was with his family and surrounded by love. We ask everyone to respect our family privacy at this time,” a family statement said. In 2020, he revealed he had Parkinson’s disease after suffering a fall.

Either clad in black or bare-chested, the singer was often the target of parents’ groups for his imagery and once caused an uproar for biting the head off a bat. Later, he would reveal himself to be a doddering and sweet father on the reality TV show “The Osbournes.”

Black Sabbath’s 1969 self-titled debut LP has been likened to the Big Bang of heavy metal. It came during the height of the Vietnam War and crashed the hippie party, dripping menace and foreboding. The cover of the record was of a spooky figure against a stark landscape. The music was loud, dense and angry, and marked a shift in rock ’n’ roll.

The band’s second album, “Paranoid,” included such classic metal tunes as “War Pigs,” “Iron Man” and “Fairies Wear Boots.” The song “Paranoid” only reached No. 61 on the Billboard Hot 100 but became in many ways the band’s signature song. Both albums were voted among the top 10 greatest heavy metal albums of all time by readers of Rolling Stone magazine.

“Black Sabbath are the Beatles of heavy metal. Anybody who’s serious about metal will tell you it all comes down to Sabbath,” Dave Navarro of the band Jane’s Addiction wrote in a 2010 tribute in Rolling Stone. “There’s a direct line you can draw back from today’s metal, through Eighties bands like Iron Maiden, back to Sabbath.”

Sabbath fired Osbourne in 1979 for his legendary excesses, like showing up late for rehearsals and missing gigs. “We knew we didn’t really have a choice but to sack him because he was just so out of control. But we were all very down about the situation,” wrote bassist Terry “Geezer” Butler in his memoir, “Into the Void.”

Osbourne reemerged the next year as a solo artist with “Blizzard of Ozz” and the following year’s “Diary of a Madman,” both hard rock classics that went multi-platinum and spawned enduring favorites such as “Crazy Train,” “Goodbye to Romance,” “Flying High Again” and “You Can’t Kill Rock and Roll.” Osbourne was twice inducted to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame — once with Sabbath in 2006 and again in 2024 as a solo artist.

The original Sabbath lineup reunited for the first time in 20 years in July 2025 in the U.K. for what Osborne said would be his final concert. “Let the madness begin!” he told 42,000 fans.

Metallica, Guns N Roses, Slayer, Tool, Pantera, Gojira, Alice in Chains, Lamb of God, Halestorm, Anthrax, Rival Sons and Mastodon did sets. Tom Morello, Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler, Billy Corgan, Ronnie Wood, Travis Barker, Sammy Hagar, Andrew Watt, Yungblud, Korn’s Jonathan Davis, Nuno Bettencourt, Chad Smith and Vernon Reid made appearances. Actor Jason Momoa was the host for the festivities.

“Black Sabbath: we’d all be different people without them, that’s the truth,” said Pantera singer Phil Anselmo. “I know I wouldn’t be up here with a microphone in my hand without Black Sabbath.”

Osbourne embodied the excesses of metal. His outlandish exploits included relieving himself on the Alamo, snorting a line of ants off a sidewalk and, most memorably, biting the head off a live bat that a fan threw onstage during a 1981 concert. (He said he thought it was rubber.)

Osbourne was sued in 1987 by parents of a 19-year-old teen who died by suicide while listening to his song “Suicide Solution.” The lawsuit was dismissed. Osbourne said the song was really about the dangers of alcohol, which caused the death of his friend Bon Scott, lead singer of AC/DC.

Then-Cardinal John J. O’Connor of New York claimed in 1990 that Osbourne’s songs led to demonic possession and even suicide. “You are ignorant about the true meaning of my songs,” the singer wrote back. “You have also insulted the intelligence of rock fans all over the world.”

Audiences at Osbourne shows could be mooned or spit on by the singer. They would often be hectored to scream along with the song, but the Satan-invoking Osbourne would usually send the crowds home with their ears ringing and a hearty “God bless!”

He started an annual tour — Ozzfest — in 1996 after he was rejected from the lineup of what was then the top touring music festival, Lollapalooza. Ozzfest has gone on to host such bands as Slipknot, Tool, Megadeth, Rob Zombie, System of a Down, Limp Bizkit and Linkin Park.

Osbourne’s look changed little over his life. He wore his long hair flat, heavy black eye makeup and round glasses, often wearing a cross around his neck. In 2013, he reunited with Black Sabbath for the dour, raw “13,” which reached No. 1 on the U.K. Albums Chart and peaked at No. 86 on the U.S. Billboard 200. In 2019, he had a Top 10 hit when featured on Post Malone’s “Take What You Want,” Osbourne’s first song in the Top 10 since 1989.

In 2020, he released the album “Ordinary Man,” which had as its title song a duet with Elton John. “I’ve been a bad guy, been higher than the blue sky/And the truth is I don’t wanna die an ordinary man,” he sang. In 2022, he landed his first career back-to-back No. 1 rock radio singles from his album “Patient Number 9,” which featured collaborations with Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, Mike McCready, Chad Smith, Robert Trujillo and Duff McKagan. It earned four Grammy nominations.

At the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony in 2024, Jack Black called him “greatest frontman in the history of rock and roll” and “the Jack Nicholson of rock.” Osbourne thanked his fans, his guitarist Randy Rhoads and his longtime wife, Sharon.

ohn Michael Osbourne was raised in the gritty city of Birmingham, England. Kids in school nicknamed him Ozzy, short for his surname. As a boy, he loved the Four Seasons, Chuck Berry and Little Richard. The Beatles made a huge impression.

“They came from Liverpool, which was approximately 60 miles north of where I come from,” he told Billboard. “So all of a sudden it was in my grasp, but I never thought it would be as successful as it became.”

In the late 1960s, Osbourne had teamed up with Butler, guitarist Tony Iommi and drummer Bill Ward as the Polka Tulk Blues Band. They decided to rename the band Earth, but found to their dismay there was another band with that name. So they changed the name to the American title of the classic Italian horror movie “I Tre Volti Della Paura,” starring Boris Karloff: Black Sabbath.

Once they found their sludgy, ominous groove, the band was productive, putting out their self-titled debut and “Paranoid” in 1970, “Master of Reality” in 1971, “Vol. 4” in 1972 and “Sabbath Bloody Sabbath” in 1973.

The music was all about industrial guitar riffs and disorienting changes in time signatures, along with lyrics that spoke of alienation and doom. “People think I’m insane because I am frowning all the time,” Osbourne sang in one song. “All day long I think of things but nothing seems to satisfy/Think I’ll lose my mind if I don’t find something to pacify.”

The Guardian newspaper in 2009 said the band “introduced working-class anger, stoner sludge grooves and witchy horror-rock to flower power. Black Sabbath confronted the empty platitudes of the 1960s and, along with Altamont and Charles Manson, almost certainly helped kill off the hippy counterculture.”

After Sabbath, Osbourne had an uncanny knack for calling some of the most creative young guitarists to his side. When he went solo, he hired the brilliant innovator Rhoads, who played on two of Osbourne’s finest solo albums, “Blizzard of Ozz” and “Diary of a Madman.” Rhoads was killed in a freak plane accident in 1982; Osbourne released the live album “Tribute” in 1987 in his memory.

Osbourne then signed Jake E. Lee, who lent his talents to the platinum albums “Bark at the Moon” and “The Ultimate Sin.” Hotshot Zakk Wylde joined Osbourne’s band for “No Rest for the Wicked” and the multiplatinum “No More Tears.”

“They come along, they sprout wings, they blossom, and they fly off,” Osbourne said of his players in 1995 to The Associated Press. “But I have to move on. To get a new player now and again boosts me on.”

Whomever he was playing with, Osbourne wasn’t likely to back down from controversy. He had the last laugh when the TV evangelist the Rev. Jimmy Swaggart in 1986 lambasted various rock groups and rock magazines as “the new pornography,” prompting some retailers to pull Osbourne’s album.

When Swaggart later was caught with a sex worker in 1988, Osbourne put out the song “Miracle Man” about his foe: “Miracle man got busted/miracle man got busted,” he sang. “Today I saw a Miracle Man, on TV cryin’/Such a hypocritical man, born again, dying.”

Much later, a whole new Osbourne would be revealed when “The Osbournes,” which ran on MTV from 2002-2005, showed this one-time self-proclaimed madman drinking Diet Cokes as he struggled to find the History Channel on his new satellite television or warning his kids not to smoke or drink before they embarked on a night on the town.

Later, he and his son Jack toured America on the travel show “Ozzy & Jack’s World Detour,” where the pair visited such places as Mount Rushmore and the Space Center Houston. Osbourne was honored in 2014 with the naming of a bat frog found in the Amazon that makes high pitched, batlike calls. It was dubbed Dendropsophus ozzyi.

He also met Queen Elizabeth II during her Golden Jubilee weekend. He was standing next to singer-actor Cliff Richard. “She took one look at the two of us, said ‘Oh, so this is what they call variety, is it?’ then cracked up laughing. I honestly thought that Sharon had slipped some acid into my cornflakes that morning,” he wrote in “I Am Ozzy.”

Osbourne met Sharon, who became her own celebrity persona, when she was running her father’s Los Angeles office. Her father was Don Arden, a top concert promoter and artist manager. She went to Osbourne’s hotel in Los Angeles to collect money, which Osbourne had spent on drugs.

“She says she’ll come back in three days and I’d better have it. I’d always fancied her and I thought, ‘Ah, she’s coming back! Maybe I have a chance.’ I had pizza hanging from my hair, cigarette ashes on my shirt,” he told the Los Angeles Times in 2000. They married in 1982, and endured periodic separations and reconciliations.

He is survived by Sharon, and their three children — Kelly, Aimee and Jack.

Mark Kennedy is at http://twitter.com/KennedyTwits

By STEPHEN GROVES and LISA MASCARO, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — House Speaker Mike Johnson is rebuffing pressure to act on the investigation into Jeffrey Epstein, instead sending members home early for a month-long break from Washington after the week’s legislative agenda was upended by Republican members who are clamoring for a vote.

Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, said Tuesday morning that he wants to give the White House “space” to release the Epstein information on its own, despite the bipartisan push for legislation that aims to force the release of more documents.

“There’s no purpose for the Congress to push an administration to do something they’re already doing,” Johnson said at his weekly press conference, his last before lawmakers depart Washington on Wednesday for their traditional August recess.

The speaker’s stance did little to alleviate the intra-party turmoil unfolding on Capitol Hill as many of President Donald Trump’s supporters demand that the administration meet its promises to publicly release a full accounting of the sex trafficking investigation into Epstein, who killed himself in his New York jail cell in 2019 while awaiting trial. Under pressure from right-wing online influencers, as well as voters back home, rank-and-file Republicans are demanding that the House intervene in the matter.

“The public’s not going to let this die, and rightfully so,” said Rep. Ralph Norman, a South Carolina Republican.

Johnson’s control of the House is under threat

The dynamic left Johnson with slipping control of his Republican conference and several crucial committees. Even before Johnson spoke Tuesday morning, a Republican-controlled subcommittee of the House Committee on Oversight was advancing a resolution to subpoena Epstein’s former girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell, for a deposition.

Johnson decided to end the House’s legislative business early this week after he essentially lost control of the powerful House Rules Committee, which sends bills to the floor for debates and votes. Late Monday evening, business on that panel ground to a halt when the Republicans on the committee abruptly recessed proceedings rather than risk more proposals from Democrats pushing them to release Epstein files.

Republicans had teed up votes on legislation to increase penalties for migrants who enter the country illegally, to ease permitting for water infrastructure and to rollback several Biden-era regulations. But all of those bills were put on hold at least until after the August recess.

Frustration in the House has been running high since last week, when Republican leaders signaled possible support for a vote on the Epstein files as they raced to pass a $9 billion package of spending cuts. GOP leader unveiled a resolution that has no legal weight but would urge the Justice Department to produce more documentation. Trump, meanwhile, has asked Attorney General Pam Bondi to seek the release of testimony from secret grand jury proceedings in the case, though that effort is unlikely to produce new revelations.

Echoing Trump’s position, Johnson insisted he, too, wants the files released, but only those that are “credible.” Johnson, who has relied heavily on Trump to hold onto leadership in the House, cast the president’s reticence to release information as out of concern for the victims of Epstein.

“We have a moral responsibility to expose the evil of Epstein and everybody who was involved in that — absolutely — and we’re resolved to do it,” Johnson said. “But we also have an equal moral responsibility to protect the innocent, and that is a fine needle to thread.”

A political wedge

Even with the month-long break, the pressure on Johnson is unlikely to end. Rep. Thomas Massie, a Republican whose contrarian stances are often a thorn in the side to leadership, is gathering support for a legislative maneuver to force the bipartisan bill to a House vote, even without leadership’s consent.

“Now, there are a lot of people here in the swamp who think that, ‘Oh, well, if we spend five weeks on vacation, the pressure for this will dissipate. I don’t think it’s going to dissipate.’” Massie told reporters Monday evening.

Democrats have watched it all unfold with glee and worked to inflame the conflict among Republicans by making their own calls for transparency on the Epstein investigation. They have repeatedly tried to force votes on the matter, casting it as an issue of trust in the government.

“It’s about transparency in government. It’s about whose side are you on? Are you on the side of the rich and powerful, protecting men? Or are you on the side of young girls and America’s children?” said Rep. Ro Khanna, the California Democrat who put forward the legislation alongside Massie.

Epstein sexually abused children hundreds of times over more than a decade, exploiting vulnerable girls as young as 14, authorities say. He couldn’t have done so without the help of Maxwell, his longtime companion, prosecutors contend.

Massie said the case is palpable enough to carry significant political consequences.

“This will be an issue that does follow Republicans through the midterms, and it will follow each individual Republican through the midterms. It will follow people into their primaries. Did you support transparency and justice, or did you come up here, get elected and fall into the swamp?” he told reporters.

He added, “I think it is a watershed moment for the speaker of the House and the president.”

By DAVID KLEPPER, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — People with congestive heart failure, undergoing treatment for schizophrenia or who have a history of paraphilic disorders will no longer be eligible for a medical waiver to serve in the military, according to new rules issued by the Pentagon on Tuesday.

The guidance signed by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth updates a list of conditions that disqualify potential recruits from serving in the armed forces. The decision comes after the Pentagon announced earlier this year that it would ban transgender troops and review other medical conditions that are currently eligible for a waiver.

“America’s warfighters must be physically and mentally capable of performing their duties in the harshest of conditions,” Hegseth wrote in the memo announcing the changes. “Severe underlying medical conditions introduce significant risks on the battlefield and threaten not only mission priorities, but also the health and safety of the affected individual and their fellow service members.”

Waivers have long been used to enlist young people who might otherwise be unqualified for military service due to a wide array of medical, conduct or other reasons.

Most waivers are issued for medical conditions ranging from asthma, eyesight problems or skin disorders to more complex health conditions, such as past psychological illness or previous sports injuries that may have healed but still must be evaluated.

Prior to the new rules, heart failure, current treatment for schizophrenia and a history of paraphilic disorders — defined as a persistent sexual interest in atypical objects or activities — were among a long list of physical and mental health conditions in which waivers were allowed.

Multiple sclerosis, a history of cystic fibrosis, past organ transplants or a suicide attempt within the past 12 months also will be considered disqualifying conditions that make a person illegible for service.

The new rules list several conditions in which a waiver may only be granted by the secretary of a military branch. Those conditions include a missing eye, hand or foot, past corneal transplants, liver failure, kidney disease, past psychotic disorders or the presence of an implanted pacemaker or defibrillator.

The detailed rules governing which medical conditions quality for a waiver have come under greater scrutiny amid the Trump administration’s ban on transgender troops.

New rules required active duty troops as well as National Guard and Reserve troops to identify themselves as transgender and voluntarily leave the service or face involuntary separations.

By MEG KINNARD and DARLENE SUPERVILLE

WASHINGTON (AP) — Former President Joe Biden’s son Hunter, seen by some as the problem child of the Democratic Party for legal and drug-related woes that brought negative attention to his father, is lashing out against Democratic “elites” and others over the way he says his father was treated during last year’s presidential campaign.

Hunter Biden spoke publicly in recent interviews about last year’s election, when Joe Biden ultimately dropped his bid and Donald Trump won the White House. In a three-hour, expletive-filled online interview with Andrew Callaghan of Channel 5, he directed ire toward actor and Democratic Party donor George Clooney for his decision to call on the elder Biden to abandon his 2024 reelection bid.

He also ranted against longtime Democratic advisers he accused of making money off the party and trading off previous electoral successes, but not helping candidates’ current efforts.

The lengthy screed made plain the younger Biden’s feelings that his father was mistreated by those around him in the waning days of his candidacy and administration. He also laid bare critiques of the party’s operation and operatives that, he says, aren’t well-serving its opposition to Trump and the Republican Party.

Here’s a look at some of the moments in Hunter Biden’s interview:

He blasted George Clooney

Hunter Biden spared no feelings in his assessment of the actor, questioning why anyone should listen to the “Ocean’s Eleven” star.

Clooney supported Joe Biden’s bid for a second term, even headlining a record-setting fundraiser for the then-president, but changed his stance after Biden’s disastrous debate performance against Trump in June 2024.

Clooney made his feelings known in an opinion piece in The New York Times, adding his voice to mounting calls for the then-81-year-old president to drop his presidential bid. Biden ended up leaving the race a few weeks later and endorsed his vice president, Kamala Harris, who went on to lose to Trump.

“What right do you have to step on a man who’s given 52 years of his f——— life to the services of this country and decide that you, George Clooney, are going to take out basically a full page ad in the f——— New York Times to undermine the president,” Hunter Biden said before he trailed off to talk about how Republicans are more unified than Democrats.

Los Angeles-based representatives for Clooney did not respond to an emailed request for comment.

Screed against longtime Democratic advisers

There were also weighty critiques of a number of longtime Democratic advisers.

Anita Dunn, a longtime Biden senior adviser, has made “$40 to $50 million” off of work for the Democratic Party, Hunter Biden said. James Carville, adviser to former President Bill Clinton, “hasn’t run a race in 40 f——— years.”

Former Obama strategist David Axelrod, Hunter Biden said, “had one success in his political life, and that was Barack Obama — and that was because of Barack Obama.” Other former Obama aides who now host “Pod Save America,” are “four white millionaires that are dining out on their association with Barack Obama from 16 years ago,” he said.

One of the four, Tommy Vietor, Monday on social media applauded Hunter Biden’s decision “to process the election, look inward, and hold himself accountable for how his family’s insular, dare I say arrogant at times, approach to politics led to this catastrophic outcome we’re all now living with.”

In a message Tuesday, Axelrod told The Associated Press, “Never have the words ‘no comment’ felt more appropriate.” Dunn did not immediately return a message seeking comment.

Biden’s debate performance and Ambien effects

As for the debate performance, the fallout from which ultimately led to the calls for his father to step down from the 2024 presidential campaign, Hunter Biden said his father may have been recovering from Ambien, a medication that he had been given to help him sleep following trips in the weeks before the debate to Europe, as well as the Los Angeles fundraiser at which Clooney said his interactions with Biden made him feel the president wasn’t mentally capable.

“He’s 81 years old, he’s tired as shit,” Hunter Biden said. “They give him Ambien to be able to sleep, and he gets up on the stage and he looks like he’s a deer in the headlights.”

A spokesperson for Joe Biden declined to comment on the interview.

Another podcast with Jaime Harrison

Hunter Biden also appeared Monday in an episode of “At Our Table,” a new podcast hosted by former Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison.

“Yeah, Joe Biden did get old. He got old before our eyes. … But you know what? A few changes does not mean that you do not have the mental capacity to be able to do your job.”

In that interview, Hunter Biden also talked about the calamitous presidential debate.

“And then they saw him at that debate. It was awful, and it was truly horrible,” he said, saying he was opposed to holding it, given Trump’s recent convictions on 34 felony charges in a New York hush money case.

To Harrison, Hunter Biden also addressed Clooney, saying, “I love George Clooney’s movies, but I don’t really give a s—- about what he thinks about who should be the nominee for the Democratic Party.”

Asked by Harrison about his father’s decision to quit the 2024 race, Hunter Biden said “I think that he could have won” but still made the right choice for Democrats broadly.”

“I know that it wasn’t a mistake in that moment,” Hunter Biden said, adding that his father “chose to save the party” over saving himself.

Why are these podcasts coming out now?

The podcast drops come just days ahead of the expected beginning of court proceedings in a Los Angeles federal court.

Hunter Biden is suing Patrick Byrne, alleging that the former CEO of Overstock.com falsely claimed that Hunter Biden was reaching out to the Iranian government in the fall of 2021 and offering to have his father Joe Biden “unfreeze” $8 billion in Iranian funds “in return for $800 million being funneled into a numbered account for us.”

In the waning days of his administration, Joe Biden pardoned his son, sparing the younger Biden a possible prison sentence for federal felony gun and tax convictions and reversing his past promises not to use the extraordinary powers of the presidency for the benefit of his family.

The Democratic president had previously said he would not pardon his son or commute his sentence after convictions in the two cases in Delaware and California. The move came weeks before Hunter Biden was set to receive his punishment after his trial conviction in the gun case and guilty plea on tax charges, and less than two months before Trump returned to the White House.

Kinnard reported from Chapin, S.C., and can be reached at http://x.com/MegKinnardAP.

Follow the AP’s coverage of Hunter Biden at https://apnews.com/hub/hunter-biden.

By ANDREW DeMILLO

It took 40 years, but Pee-wee’s bike is now at the Alamo. Just not the basement.

The Alamo announced last week it had acquired and would display the iconic bike from the 1985 Tim Burton film, “Pee-wee’s Big Adventure.”

The San Antonio landmark plays a key role in the film chronicling Pee-wee Herman’s search for his stolen bicycle when a devious fortuneteller tells him the bike is located in the Alamo’s basement. Pee-wee, played by the late Paul Reubens, learns the Alamo doesn’t have a basement, but hasn’t stopped tourists from tongue-in-cheek inquiries.

“It’s the most common question our guest services team hears is, ‘Where is the basement at the Alamo?’” said Jonathan Huhn, senior communications director for the Alamo Trust, Inc., the nonprofit organization that oversees the Alamo’s operations. “It’s an iconic piece of Alamo pop-culture history.”

The red-and-white bike — or as Pee-wee calls it in the movie, “the best bike in the whole world” — is adorned with streamers on the handlebars and a lion emblem at the front. Huhn said it was acquired from an auction in Los Angeles.

The bike will serve as a centerpiece in the Mays Family Legacy Gallery, which examines the the Alamo’s cultural impact, part of a new visitor center and museum slated to open in fall 2027. It will join other pop culture items including memorabilia from the 1960 movie about the Alamo that starred John Wayne.

“It’s really a pop culture bridge” that will bring people to learn about the Alamo’s history, Huhn said.

But before then, the bike will go on display for a limited time at the Ralston Family Collections Center. The Alamo also plans to host a free public screening of “Pee-wee’s Big Adventure” in Plaza de Valero. More details about dates for the display and the screening will be released later.

Unlike the Alamo, the building where Pee-wee’s bike will eventually be located does have a basement. But, before you ask, that’s not where the bike will be.

By MARIA SHERMAN

NEW YORK (AP) — Billy Joel is doing much better, the “Piano Man” singer wants fans to know.

In May, Joel canceled all his upcoming concerts across North America and England after being diagnosed with fluid buildup in his brain that has affected his “hearing, vision and balance.” The condition is called Normal Pressure Hydrocephalus, “a brain disorder that can affect brain-related abilities, including thinking and concentrating, memory, movement and more,” the Cleveland Clinic says.

“I know a lot of people are worried about me and my health, but I’m OK,” Joel said in an interview with People magazine. “What I have is something very few people know about, including me, no matter how much you try to research it. I’m doing my best to work with it and to recover from it.”

“It was scary, but I’m OK,” Joel, 76, says. “I just wanted to let people know, don’t worry about me being deathly ill or anything.”

He also discussed his health in an episode of comedian Bill Maher’s Club Random podcast, telling the host he feels “fine,” adding that, “My balance sucks. It’s like being on a boat… They keep referring to what I have as a brain disorder, so it sounds a lot worse than what I’m feeling.”

He added that his health issues are not “fixed,” but “it’s still being worked on.”

A representative for Joel declined additional comment.

In March, the “Uptown Girl” singer announced that he underwent surgery and had to undergo physical therapy. A statement at the time said doctors expected him to make a full recovery. It is unclear if his medical issues at the time were related to Normal Pressure Hydrocephalus.

The condition can cause problems with walking, bladder control and thinking, with symptoms worsening if left untreated. It’s relatively rare and can be hard to diagnose. It can be treated successfully with surgery to install a tube to drain excess fluid. Patients may need physical therapy in addition to surgery.

By DAVID BAUDER

Stephen Colbert returned for his first full program after last week’s announcement that CBS was canceling his “Late Show” with some supportive late-night guests, a joke about cancel culture and an extremely pointed remark directed at President Donald Trump.

“I’m going to go ahead and say it: Cancel culture’s gone way too far,” Colbert said to a rambunctious audience that loudly chanted his name.

CBS and parent Paramount Global said the decision to end the “Late Show” next May was purely financial. It hasn’t gone unnoticed — and was mentioned by Colbert Monday night — that the announcement came days after the comic had sharply criticized Paramount’s $16 million settlement of Trump’s lawsuit over a “60 Minutes” interview.

Colbert, known for his sharp comic takedowns of the president, said that “over the weekend, it sunk in that they killed off our show. But they made one mistake. They left me alive.”

Now, he said, “I can say what I really think of Donald Trump, starting right now.” As his audience cheered him on, Colbert said, “I don’t care for him. Doesn’t seem to have the skill set to be president.”

Colbert’s personal message to President Donald Trump

He read a passage from a Trump social media message saying that he loved that the “untalented” Colbert had been fired.

“How dare you, sir,” Colbert said. “Would an untalented man be able to compose the following satirical witticism?” The show switched to a close-up camera where Colbert appeared to say, “f—- you,” the word bleeped out and his mouth blurred.

Noting CBS’ explanation for his firing, Colbert said, “how can it purely be a financial decision if the show is No. 1 in the ratings? It’s confusing. A lot of folks are asking that question, mainly my staff’s parents and spouses.”

With some apparent irritation, he said some news stories over the weekend reported the apparently leaked information that “Late Show” was losing between $40 million and $50 million a year. Ad revenue for late-night entertainment broadcasts has shrunk sharply as the audience, particularly young men, turn to streaming or other priorities.

“I could see us losing $24 million,” Colbert said. “But where would Paramount have ever spent the other $16 million? Oh, yeah.”

Colbert introduced the odd duo of “Weird Al” Yankovic and Lin-Manuel Miranda to sing Coldplay’s “Viva La Vida.” In a sly reference to the couple caught on camera last week at a Coldplay concert, “Late Show” cameras panned the audience to find some supportive friends — fellow late-night hosts Jimmy Fallon, Seth Meyers, Jon Stewart and John Oliver, as well as Adam Sandler, Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen.

Thanking audience members for support

Colbert turned serious — briefly — to address people who had expressed support for him since the announcement was made.

“Some people see this show going away as the sign of something truly dire. And while I’m a big fan of me, I don’t necessarily agree with that statement,” he said, “because we here at the ‘Late Show’ never saw our job as changing anything other than how you felt at the end of the day, which I think is a worthy goal.

“Or,” he continued, “changing how you felt the next morning when you watched on your phone, which is why broadcast TV is dying.”

David Bauder writes about the intersection of media and entertainment for the AP. Follow him at http://x.com/dbauder and https://bsky.app/profile/dbauder.bsky.social.

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By JESSICA DAMIANO

I hate to break it to you, but just like your calendar can’t tell you the best time to harvest, it won’t provide you the perfect date to attack the pests waging war on your plants.

Timing effective pest control is all about understanding how the weather affects insect life cycles.

We know that most plants and insects emerge in spring, advance through summer, and, in cold regions, go dormant over winter. But beyond those general seasonal cycles, there’s no way to predict precisely when, for example, seeds will sprout, garlic will be ready for harvest or pests will be at their most vulnerable.

Those developmental stages vary from year to year because they’re dependent on the weather.

That’s where growing degree days come in.

GDD is a cumulative system used to determine exactly when plants and insects will reach certain stages of maturity. And with so much variability — with different pests having different life stages that are vulnerable (or resistant) to different control methods at different times — it’s a helpful tool for gardeners.

The system, introduced by the French entomologist René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur in 1735, is a measurement of heat accumulation that accurately predicts when seeds will germinate, crops will mature and specific pest populations will hatch and reach advancing stages of maturity.

The progression of an insect’s life cycle, like much of the natural world’s biological activity, is dictated by environmental factors like temperature. And because not every life stage will succumb to treatment, weather is the only thing that can truly accurately inform the timing of many control methods.

Here’s how it works

The average daily temperature is typically recorded on March 1, and for each degree over 50 degrees Fahrenheit, one point is assigned. Then, every day throughout the remainder of the season, the number of degrees over 50 is added to a running tally. If the temperature is exactly at or below 50 degrees, the day is assigned a score of zero.

Let’s say the temperature was 53 degrees on March 1; the GDD on that day would be 3. If it was 60 on March 2, the GDD would be 3 plus 10, or 13. If the temperature was 49 on March 3, that would add nothing, and the accumulated growing degree days would remain at 13. The tally continues to grow through a regionally specific date in the fall.

Seems complicated? The good news is you don’t have to crunch the numbers yourself.

Your local cooperative extension office likely tailors and tracks this information for your region, and many post the GDD, as well as pest- and plant-specific GDD guidelines, on their websites. In addition, the agricultural company Syngenta offers a handy tool among its GreenCast online resources that quickly generates the GDD for your zip code.

What does this mean for your garden?

As an example, Colorado potato beetle eggs and pupae are not susceptible to pesticides, so attempting control during those stages would be pointless. But their larvae are vulnerable to the natural biological control Bt from the time they emerge until they reach ¼ inch in length. Rather than heading out into the garden with a ruler — or spraying every day and hoping for the best — you can time the application for between 65 and 185 GDD.

Similarly, the first generation of euonymus scale insects are most vulnerable to Neem oil and horticultural oil treatments between 400 and 575 GDD.

And for pre-emergent crabgrass controls, like corn gluten meal, to be effective, they should be applied just before 200 GDD. That’s why I recommend a treatment window that coincides with the time between when the first forsythia blooms and the last of the lilacs fade: It’s a visual cue tied to nature’s reaction to temperature.

Depending on the variety, most tomatoes, which love the heat, are ripe for the picking between 1,000 and 2,000 GDD. But, for the record, my tomatoes always let me know when they’re ready.

Jessica Damiano writes weekly gardening columns for the AP and publishes the award-winning Weekly Dirt Newsletter. You can sign up here for weekly gardening tips and advice.

For more AP gardening stories, go to https://apnews.com/hub/gardening.

By RACHEL S. HUNT

How much has social media changed the way we talk and behave?

That’s the question linguist and content creator Adam Aleksic sets out to answer in his debut book “Algospeak.”

If you already know what words like “yeet,” “rizz,” “brainrot” or “blackpilled” mean, some of this information might not come as a surprise to you. Still, Aleksic’s analysis reaffirms how this language came about and why it continues to proliferate. For those unfamiliar, it acts as an accessible entry point into social media slang and its evolution.

“Algospeak” touches on a wide array of topics, including in-groups and out-groups, censorship, language appropriation, extremism online, microtrends, clickbait and generational divides. The chapters build on each other with a textbook-level attention to vocabulary.

This book serves as a sobering reality check on how social media is affecting not just our speech, but our entire identities.

“Social media creates new identities in order to commodify them,” Aleksic writes in a chapter about microtrends and micro-labels. “Your decisions are now curated for you under the guise of personalization, while in reality they’re engineered to make platforms as much money as possible.”

As a self-proclaimed “etymology nerd,” Aleksic leans heavily into his experience as a content creator, providing a crash course into social media history and how to game the ever-changing and opaque “algorithm.” His tone is academic, yet approachable, and he’s bold but pragmatic in his assertions, exploring counterarguments sufficiently.

He identifies the transient nature of language and the algorithm immediately, since the cultural references in “Algospeak” risk expiring quickly as trends change and social media platforms shift — but that’s the point.

“‘The algorithm’ is here to stay. This is why I think it’s absolutely worth talking about even the most fleeting words,” Aleksic writes.

Aleksic’s writing feels personable and knowledgeable as he translates his online presence offline, and in doing so, demonstrates his own claims about parasocial relationships and owning one’s audience. Keeping up with the algorithmic cycle is portrayed as exhausting, but as a necessary evil for influencers supporting their livelihoods through social media.

“Algospeak” is a fascinating blend of etymology, psychology, cultural analysis and first-person perspective. The book acts as both a snapshot of our current, social media-imbued society and as an intellectual foundation for language developments to come.

Aleksic leaves his reader with questions about the threats and opportunities that stem from social media developments, but undeniably one principle is true: social media has breached containment and is influencing not only the way we talk, but the way we live.

“Algorithms are the culprits, influencers are the accomplices, language is the weapon, and you, dear reader, are the victim,” he writes.

By TRACEE M. HERBAUGH

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (AP) — Romance novels have always spiced up quiet nights. Now, a genre that has sometimes been dismissed as a guilty pleasure is bringing readers and writers together through social media, book clubs and a growing number of romance-specific bookstores.

At a recent launch party for Nora Dahlia’s enemies-to-friends romance “Pick-Up” at Lovestruck Books, a romance-dedicated store in Cambridge, Massachusetts, a crowd of women sipped cocktails from the bar-café as they browsed the shelves.

After Dahlia’s reading, patrons stuck around to mingle, swap contact info and trade author recommendations.

It was a particularly social event for a book talk. But the communal atmosphere is typical of events for romance fans.

Dahlia likened romance readers to “Comic-Con folks,” referring to the deep-rooted passion that defines comic-book fandom.

“They’re educated on the genre in a real way,” Dahlia said. “Many of them started reading romance — Danielle Steel, V.C. Andrews, Jude Deveraux — as teenagers.”

At The Ripped Bodice bookstore in Brooklyn, New York, manager Katherine Zofrea said romance fans who have connected online frequently come into the store to meet in person. Along with author events, the store hosts three different book clubs and a romance comedy night.

“We’ve had a couple proposals here, we’ve had a wedding here which was really fun,” Zofrea said.

She said customers range “from teenagers who are starting to really get into the romance genres to older folks who have been romance readers for their entire lives and remember way back when they were reading the Harlequins and romance wasn’t as widely accepted.

“Now they’re loving seeing how widely accepted romance has become.”

A boom in romance bookstores

Bookstores like Lovestruck and The Ripped Bodice (which has a flagship store in Los Angeles) have begun popping up all over the U.S., from Wichita, Kansas, to Wilmington, North Carolina, to Hopkinsville, Kentucky.

Of the 157 romance-dedicated bookstores in the American Booksellers Association, more than half opened within the last two years, said Allison Hill, CEO of the trade group for independent sellers.

“Romance books have been one of the fastest growing book sales categories in recent years, driven by a number of factors including the need for escape reading and BookTok,” Hill said.

And the genre has evolved. “The romance genre is more diverse in every way including character identity and plot,” she said.

Lovestruck’s owner, Rachel Kanter, called the boom “incredible — and honestly, overdue. Romance has always been one of the most commercially successful genres, but for a long time it didn’t get the respect or space it deserved in the literary world.”

Romance-specific bookstores, she says, “are places where readers can feel joy, comfort, and connection — and where love is taken seriously as a literary theme.”

A lifeline during COVID

As with many hobbies, romance fandom solidified and expanded after the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The pandemic had pushed so many people toward reading for escape and comfort, and romance became a lifeline for a lot of folks,” said Kanter.

“At the same time, there was a wider cultural shift happening — people were rethinking what mattered, craving joy and softness, and looking to support indie businesses that reflected their values. Romance, with all its hope and heart, met that moment beautifully,” she said.

Reimagining the romantic bond

Romance has countless subgenres — hockey romance, Western romance, LGBTQ romance, even romance set on prison planets. But a common theme is their “inherently hopeful storylines,” says Elizabeth Michaelson Monaghan, a 52-year-old freelance writer and editor in New York who said she’s read “hundreds” of romance novels.

“Romance must have a happily-ever-after — or at least a happily-for-now. Romance writers and readers are very clear on this,” she said.

Romantic fiction that doesn’t end that way? That’s just a love story.

Traits of the romance genre also include strong character descriptions, attraction, conflict, and a satisfying resolution and emotional growth. Expect plenty of steam — some authors deploy it explicitly, others are more tame.

There’s a long-standing culture of (mostly) women reading and sharing these books across generations.

“It is pleasurable to reimagine courtship or the romantic bond,” said Jayashree Kamble, professor of English at LaGuardia Community College and president of the International Association for the Study of Popular Romance. “There is limited risk involved.”

Kamble has been a voracious romance reader since her teenage years in India, where she devoured Harlequin romances.

Romance novels, she said, are “a lovely reminder that individualism and companionship can go together. These are basic bonds.”

Community: online and in real life

Podcasts, too, have become a source for discovering what’s trending. Andrea Martucci, creator and host of the romance-focused “Shelf Love” podcast, said romance bookstores have become places of connection akin, in some ways, to churches — for the romantically devoted.

“I can go to a bookstore and not just find people who love books,” she said, “but find people who love the very same books I love.”

As Annabel Monaghan, author of several love stories including “Nora Goes Off Script,” puts it, “People who read romance want to feel good. And when you gather a bunch of people who want to feel good, it’s magic.”

By MICHELLE CHAPMAN, AP Business Writer

Pop Mart has struck it rich. The Chinese company that caters to toy connoisseurs and influencers said this week that it expects profit for the first six months of this year to jump by at least 350% compared with the prior-year period, largely because of its smash hit plush toy, the Labubu. Pop Mart joins a small list of companies that have tapped into the zeitgeist, drawing in millions of buyers who, for one reason or another, simply must get their hands on a toy or gadget of the moment.

But what makes the Labubu a must-have, or any toy for that matter, is a decades-old question that toy makers have yet to figure out.

Here’s a look at some of the most popular toys over the years.

Cabbage Patch Kids

Cabbage Patch Kids began as chubby-faced dolls with yarn hair that came with adoption papers. During the 1980s the dolls were so popular that parents waited in long lines at stores trying to get a hold of them. More than 90 million Cabbage Patch Kids were sold worldwide during their heyday.

Cabbage Patch Kids, which were created by Xavier Roberts and initially sold by Coleco, were relaunched in 2004, looking to take part in the successful return of other popular 1980s toys including Strawberry Shortcake, Care Bears and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

A Cabbage Patch Kid museum named BabyLand General Hospital still exists in Cleveland, Georgia. The dolls entered the National Toy Hall of Fame in 2023.

Beanie Baby

Beanie Babies captivated consumers in the mid-1990s. The cuddly $5 toys were under-stuffed for maximum hug-ability, stamped with cute names on their Ty Inc. tags, and given limited edition runs.

Many people collected, traded and sold the toys with the hopes that their value would just keep going up at the dawn of the e-commerce age. It made some people money, and the founder, Ty Warner, a billionaire in three years.

In 2014 Warner learned that he would not go to prison for hiding at least $25 million from U.S. tax authorities and instead received two years’ probation. Warner, one of the highest profile figures snared in a federal investigation of Americans using Swiss bank accounts to avoid U.S. taxes, had pleaded guilty to a single count of tax evasion.

Tamagotchi

Looking for a pet without the real-life responsibilities? Well then the Tamagotchi electronic pet from Bandai was for you. Consumers were hooked on the egg-shaped plastic toy that first launched in Japan in 1996 and became a craze worldwide in the late 1990s and 2000s.

Users were tasked with taking care of their virtual pet by pressing buttons that simulate feeding, disciplining and playing with the critter on screen. If a Tamagotchi is neglected, it dies.

In 2013 Tamagotchi was reborn as a mobile app, duplicating the experience of the plastic handheld toy. The toy was inducted into the World Video Game Hall of Fame in May.

Fidget Spinner

Fidget spinners — the 3-inch twirling gadgets that took over classrooms and cubicles — were all the rage in 2017. The toy was considered somewhat of an outlier at the time, given that it wasn’t made by a major company, timed for the holiday season, or promoted in TV commercials. Fidget spinners were more easily found at gas stations or 7-Eleven than at big toy chains.

Fidget spinners had been around for years, mostly used by kids with autism or attention disorders to help them concentrate, but they became more popular after being featured on social media.

While hot toys are often made by one company, fidget spinners were made by numerous manufacturers, mostly in China. The toys were marketed as a concentration aid but became so popular among children that many schools started banning them, saying that they were a distraction.

Labubu

The Labubu, by artist and illustrator Kasing Lung, first appeared as monsters with pointed ears and pointy teeth in three picture books inspired by Nordic mythology in 2015.

In 2019 Lung struck a deal with Pop Mart, a company that caters to toy connoisseurs and influencers, to sell Labubu figurines. But it wasn’t until Pop Mart started selling Labubu plush toys on key rings in 2023 that the toothy monsters suddenly seemed to be everywhere, including in the hands of Rihanna, Kim Kardashian and NBA star Dillon Brooks. K-pop singer Lisa of Blackpink began posting images of hers for her more than 100 million followers on Instagram and on TikTok, where Labubu pandemonium has broken out.

Labubu has been a bonanza for Pop Mart. Its revenue more than doubled in 2024 to 13.04 billion yuan ($1.81 billion), thanks in part to its elvish monster. Revenue from Pop Mart’s plush toys soared more than 1,200% in 2024, nearly 22% of its overall revenue, according to the company’s annual report.

Today is Saturday, July 19, the 200th day of 2025. There are 165 days left in the year.

Today in history:

On July 19, 1848, the first “Convention to discuss the social, civil and religious condition and rights of Woman” convened at the Wesleyan Chapel in Seneca Falls, N.Y.

Also on this date:

In 1812, during the War of 1812, the First Battle of Sackets Harbor in Lake Ontario resulted in an American victory as U.S. naval forces repelled a British attack.

In 1969, Apollo 11 and its astronauts, Neil Armstrong, Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin and Michael Collins, went into orbit around the moon.

In 1975, the Apollo and Soyuz space capsules that were linked in orbit for two days separated.

In 1979, the Nicaraguan capital of Managua fell to Sandinista guerrillas, two days after President Anastasio Somoza fled the country.

In 1980, the Moscow Summer Olympics began, minus dozens of nations that were boycotting the games because of Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan.

In 1989, 111 people were killed when United Air Lines Flight 232, a DC-10 which sustained the uncontained failure of its tail engine and the loss of hydraulic systems, crashed while making an emergency landing at Sioux City, Iowa; 185 other people survived.

In 1990, baseball’s all-time hits leader, Pete Rose, was sentenced in Cincinnati to five months in prison for tax evasion.

In 1993, President Bill Clinton announced a policy allowing gays to serve in the military under a compromise dubbed “don’t ask, don’t tell, don’t pursue.”

In 2006, prosecutors reported that Chicago police beat, kicked, shocked or otherwise tortured scores of Black suspects from the 1970s to the early 1990s to try to extract confessions from them.

In 2005, President George W. Bush announced his choice of federal appeals court judge John G. Roberts Jr. to replace Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor. (Roberts ended up succeeding Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, who died in Sept. 2005; Samuel Alito followed O’Connor.)

In 2013, in a rare and public reflection on race, President Barack Obama called on the nation to do some soul searching over the death of Trayvon Martin and the acquittal of his shooter, George Zimmerman, saying the slain Black teenager “could have been me 35 years ago.”

In 2018, a duck boat packed with tourists capsized and sank in high winds on a lake in the tourist town of Branson, Missouri, killing 17 people.

In 2021, Paul Allard Hodgkins, a Florida man who breached the U.S. Senate chamber on Jan. 6, 2021, carrying a Trump campaign flag, received an eight-month prison term in the first resolution of a felony case arising from the U.S. Capitol insurrection. (In 2025, President Donald Trump pardoned, commuted the prison sentences or vowed to dismiss the cases of all 1,500-plus people charged with crimes in the riot.)

In 2022, Britain shattered its record for the highest temperature ever registered amid a heat wave that seared swaths of Europe.

Today’s Birthdays:

• Civil rights activist and educator Rachel Robinson, widow of baseball’s Jackie Robinson, is 103.
• Blues singer-musician Little Freddie King is 85.
• Singer-musician Alan Gorrie (Average White Band) is 79.
• International Tennis Hall of Famer Ilie Nastase is 79.
• Rock musician Brian May (Queen) is 78.
• Rock musician Bernie Leadon is 78.
• Movie director Abel Ferrara is 74.
• Movie director Atom Egoyan is 65.
• Actor Campbell Scott is 64.
• Actor Anthony Edwards is 63.
• Ukrainian politician and former boxing champion Vitali Klitschko is 54.
• Actor Benedict Cumberbatch is 49.
• TV chef Marcela Valladolid is 47.
• Actor Trai Byers (TV: “Empire”) is 42.

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Today is Tuesday, July 15, the 196th day of 2024. There are 169 days left in the year.

Today in history:

On July 15, 1799, the Rosetta Stone, a key to deciphering ancient Egyptian scripts, was found at Fort Julien in the Nile Delta during the Napoleonic campaign in Egypt.

Also on this date:

In 1834, the Spanish Inquisition was abolished more than 350 years after its creation.

In 1870, Georgia became the last Confederate state to be readmitted to the Union.

In 1913, Democrat Augustus Bacon of Georgia became the first person elected to the U.S. Senate under the terms of the recently ratified 17th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, providing for popular election of senators.

In 1916, The Boeing Company, originally known as Pacific Aero Products Co., was founded in Seattle.

In 1975, three American astronauts blasted off aboard an Apollo spaceship hours after two Soviet cosmonauts were launched aboard a Soyuz spacecraft for a mission that included a linkup of the two ships in orbit.

In 1976, a 36-hour kidnap ordeal began for 26 schoolchildren and their bus driver as they were abducted near Chowchilla, California, by three gunmen and imprisoned in an underground cell. (The captives escaped unharmed; the kidnappers were caught.)

In 1996, MSNBC, a 24-hour all-news network, made its debut on cable and the internet.

In 1997, fashion designer Gianni Versace, 50, was shot dead outside his Miami Beach home; suspected gunman Andrew Phillip Cunanan (koo-NAN’-an), 27, was found dead eight days later, a suicide. (Investigators believed Cunanan killed four other people before Versace in a cross-country rampage that began the previous March.)

In 2002, John Walker Lindh, an American who’d fought alongside the Taliban in Afghanistan, pleaded guilty in federal court in Alexandria, Virginia, to two felonies in a deal sparing him life in prison.

In 2006, Twitter (now known as X) was launched to the public.

In 2019, avowed white supremacist James Alex Fields Jr. was sentenced by a state court to life in prison plus 419 years for killing one and injuring dozens when he deliberately drove his car into a crowd of anti-racism protesters during a rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. (The previous month, Fields received a life sentence on 29 federal hate crime charges.)

In 2020, George Floyd’s family filed a lawsuit against the city of Minneapolis and the four police officers charged in his death, alleging the officers violated Floyd’s rights when they restrained him and that the city allowed a culture of excessive force, racism and impunity to flourish in its police force. (The city would agree to pay $27 million to settle the lawsuit in March 2021.)

Today’s Birthdays:

• Actor Patrick Wayne is 86.
• R&B singer Millie Jackson is 81.
• Singer Linda Ronstadt is 79.
• Author Richard Russo is 76.
• Musician Trevon Horn is 76.
• Arianna Huffington, co-founder of The Huffington Post, is 75.
• Former professional wrestler and Minnesota governor Jesse Ventura is 74.
• Actor Terry O’Quinn (TV: “Lost”) is 73.
• Rock drummer Marky Ramone is 73.
• Rock musician Joe Satriani is 69.
• Model Kim Alexis is 65.
• Actor Willie Aames is 65.
• Actor-director Forest Whitaker is 64.
• Actor Brigitte Nielsen is 62.
• Rock drummer Jason Bonham is 59.
• TV personality Adam Savage (TV” “MythBusters”) is 58.
• Actor-comedian Eddie Griffin is 57.
• Actor-screenwriter Jim Rash (TV: “Community”) is 53.
• Actor Scott Foley is 53.
• Actor Brian Austin Green is 52.
• Singer Buju Banton is 52.
• Actor Diane Kruger is 49.
• Actor Lana Parrilla (LAH’-nuh pa-REE’-uh) is 48.
• Actor Travis Fimmel is 46.
• Actor-singer Tristan “Mack” Wilds is 36.
• Actor Iain Armitage (TV: “Young Sheldon”) is 17.