Latest news with #Valentine
India Today
17 hours ago
- India Today
Grok to get text-to-video generation feature in October, Elon Musk confirms
Grok is now gearing up to launch its text-to-video generation feature. The company has confirmed that this new feature will be rolled out in October 2025. Elon Musk has also reposted the announcement, sharing that the feature will be available across the Grok platform, including the app. 'You'll soon be able to generate videos on Grok. Download the standalone @Grokapp and subscribe,' he wrote in his official Grok account on X has further shared more details about this new feature. The company revealed that Grok's video generation capabilities will be powered by its Imagine feature, which runs on the Aurora engine. Using this, users will be able to create instant videos with audio directly from text prompts. The company also noted that early access will begin in October for Super Grok subscribers. It's a paid subscription available at $30 per month. 'Video generation is coming to Grok via our Imagine feature, powered by Aurora. Create instant videos with sound from text prompts. Download the standalone Grok app, subscribe to Super Grok, and join the waitlist for early access in October,' reveals Grok in its post on X. Users can already join the waitlist, to access the upcoming video-generation feature through the standalone Grok app. According to xAI, Super Grok subscribers will receive the update first in October, with broader availability planned after the initial the Grok app already offers features such as image generation, conversational AI, and voice chat. Soon, the text-to-video feature will be added to its suite of media creation tools.A few weeks ago xAI also launched customisable AI companions for Grok AI. This companion feature debuted with three characters:– Valentine, a male companion inspired by characters like Edward Cullen from the movie Twilight and Christian Grey from the movie Fifty Shades of Grey.– Ani, a goth-style anime avatar, and– Rudy, a red panda characters are currently available exclusively to Super Grok subscribers and can be activated within the Grok AI is part of the broader X Premium+ subscription, which bundles together a range of advanced AI features for paying users. The Super Grok subscribers have access to more advanced Grok AI features including DeepSearch, real-time data access, and enhanced image generation.- Ends
Daily Mirror
2 days ago
- Health
- Daily Mirror
'I was told painful toilet sign was menopause, but it wasn't'
Susan Seargent, 56, known to many as Charlie, went to the doctor after suffering with exhaustion, abdominal pain and recurring UTIs in 2020 A woman who was told her exhaustion was due to the stress of being a teacher was diagnosed with stage three cancer. Susan Seargent, 56, known as Charlie, sought medical advice after experiencing exhaustion, abdominal pain and recurring UTIs in 2020. She was reassured that she was going through the menopause and that her symptoms were also linked to the stress of her teaching job. She was fitted with a Mirena coil and began hormone replacement therapy (HRT) to alleviate the symptoms. However, during a trip to Norfolk with her husband Peter, 53, in February 2023, Susan found herself needing to urinate frequently, then struggling to do so at other times. Scans revealed a 17cm cyst and she underwent an emergency hysterectomy. But, six weeks later, doctors confirmed it was stage three endometrial cancer, which had spread. After undergoing six rounds of chemotherapy, Susan is now in remission and raising funds for cancer charities. Susan, from Lower Hartshay, Derbyshire, said: "I don't blame anyone. But looking back, I now see how all those little things, the fatigue, the UTIs, the pain after eating, were pointing to something more serious. "Menopause is finally being taken seriously, which is so important. But I do think we need more awareness that not everything is the menopause. Some symptoms can be signs of something else." Primary school teacher Susan began seeking medical advice for her symptoms in 2020, which included recurrent urinary tract infections, abdominal pain, and fatigue. These were largely attributed to the stress of her profession and the hormonal changes associated with menopause. Trusting this diagnosis, Susan had a Mirena coil fitted and commenced hormone replacement therapy (HRT). She recalled: "I even remember doctors increasing the dosage of vaginal oestrogen in my HRT because of the UTIs." However, it wasn't until a trip to Norfolk with her husband Peter during Valentine's week in February 2023 that Susan realised something was seriously amiss. She explained: "We'd walked miles, and I kept needing the toilet every 30 minutes. Then one night, I woke up needing to go and just couldn't. The pain was excruciating." Following an emergency hospital visit where she was fitted with a catheter, scans revealed a 17cm cyst when her symptoms failed to improve. Showing her resilience, Susan humorously named it "Cedric the cyst". She underwent an emergency full hysterectomy and, six weeks later, received the devastating news that it was cancer. She said: "They said it was a low chance it would be anything serious. But it was stage three and had already spread to the outside lining of my uterus, in the fluid and right ovary, which they found after the peritoneal washing. It was very hard to hear." Susan was referred to oncology and underwent six rounds of chemotherapy, from August to September 2023, each round lasting six-and-a-half hours. Despite losing her hair and strength, she refused to let the diagnosis define her. To maintain a positive outlook, she set herself a challenge: walking the Limestone Way whilst undergoing treatment. She said: "I was sick, wearing a bobbly hat, holding walking poles and being overtaken by everyone. But I kept going. It helped my mental health, and people started telling me my story inspired them to get outdoors too." It wasn't until after her cancer treatment had concluded that Susan saw a menopause specialist. She said: "I finally got an appointment, two years after being referred, and this was unfortunately after my hysterectomy and chemotherapy. The specialist just said, 'I'm so sorry I'm only just seeing you now.' It was just too late." The cancer had progressed to stage 3. Susan is of the belief that if she had seen the menopause specialist earlier and had a smear test sooner, they could have potentially discovered it before it reached this stage. When women reach the age of 50, the smear test is every five years, however Susan's last smear test was in 2019 and her cancer was detected and diagnosed in 2023. Now on the road to recovery, she's planning to cycle 56 miles in the Chris Hoy Tour de 4 on September 7, using an electric bike as part of her ongoing healing journey. She said: "I've had 'Cedric the cyst' removed, and 'Hetty the hernia' too and this is the next step for me." Susan is planning to raise awareness and fundraise for the Children's Cancer Unit Charity, inspired by her 19 year old daughter Martha's primary school friend, who also battled cancer in primary school. Susan said: "When you think of how tough cancer is as an adult and then imagine a 10 or 11 year-old going through it, it's just heart-breaking. That's why I'm doing this."
Winnipeg Free Press
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Winnipeg Free Press
Enchanting interludes
Somehow, Heather O'Neill has crafted a delightfully fleeting, 200-plus page epic. Valentine in Montreal has the principal features of the daunting form, but all in charming miniature. O'Neill, much and justly celebrated as a resoundingly successful Canadian poet, short-story writer, screenwriter, novelist and journalist, was able to fashion this riff on the traditional literary genre by adapting another conventional publication form: Valentine is not so much a modern novel as it is a compendium of a traditional serial. In 2023, a Montreal Gazette editor asked O'Neill to compose a serialized novel, very much in the Victorian mode. Suspecting failure would accompany the unusual effort, O'Neill nonetheless dove in, hoping it would not just challenge her chops but connect her with writing and writers past, especially Charles Dickens. More, it could help her realize her belief that good fiction ought to be democratized, something the archaic serial form had done — and perhaps could still do — so expediently. Elisa Harb photo Heather O'Neill (right) has enlisted her daughter Arizona (left) to illustrate her two most recent books. O'Neill is probably most famous as the unicorn double winner of CBC's Canada Reads: her own extraordinarily beautiful and moving novel, Lullabies for Little Criminals (2006), won the 2007 competition, and she last year was victorious in championing Catherine Leroux's 2020 L'Avenir (in English as The Future, 2023 translation by Susan Ouriou). O'Neill's credentials roster is long, wondrous and vigorous, including cherished novels in 2014, 2017, 2022 and 2024 (the most recent The Capital of Dreams), as well as collections of poems (1999) and short stories (2015). Throw in the scripts for a difficult-to-find but lovely-to-behold feature film, Saint Jude (2000), and the eight-minute short End of Pinky (which can be found on YouTube), and you have here an artist bursting with talent and skill at the absolute and sustained top of her astounding game. Our micro-epic voyageur here is Valentine Bennet, a young, shy, lone-but-not-lonely and humble heroine who is utterly content with her modest work at a dépanneur at the Berri-UQAM métro stop. Valentine lives to dwell in her métro beneath and amidst the city, and is therefore deeply disturbed when her entrenched patterns are upset. She is quickly thrown much outside her world — or at least much further into it. Valentine, orphan (Dickens!) and amateur poet, learns that she has a doppelganger, Yelena, a ballerina, an artist of a different stripe. Valentine must quest out into the urban world, more Yelena's than her own, using her métro as her steed. She must acquaint with eccentric strangers, she must dodge the dodgy and she must figure out who she really is. All this in 30 quite steadfastly short, serial chapters. These instalments are all discrete and intended to be read, as O'Neill herself announces, in a single, Saturday-morning-with-coffee-and-eggs sitting. To be sure, there are recaps of whence we've been and dangles of whither we go, but it is all done without inelegant intrusion. En route, there are cases of mistaken identity, there in an unearthing of an aged common ancestor who herself used to galivant across Europe in full bohemian but somehow lucrative mode. And there is a forbidding Montreal underbelly, something literally called 'the Mafia,' but barking more than biting. And there is also a very dear romance in this little Romance. The dalliance cannot and does not fully fruit, but it is there, and it brings with it, too, the requisite wisdom and sadness. Valentine in Montreal just abounds in interlude. There are moments in each of the 30 little pieces to make you grin, to make you chortle aloud; all gracefully connect and carefully construct. Weekly A weekly look at what's happening in Winnipeg's arts and entertainment scene. More, the book is accompanied by delightful, childlike illustrations — a least one, and often several, per chapter. The artist, Arizona O'Neill (the author's daughter), typically poaches a moment of the text, usually a figurative one, and runs with it in an absolutely frolicsome way. Because one has to pause over the images to realize what is going on, the artwork is able, most delicately, to enhance the text. Throughout, Heather O'Neill's habitual mastery loiters. She is marvelously writes in a manner that briskly moves all things well along while peppering in, again and aptly again, turns of phrase that catch your breath and even command an immediate re-reading. Oddly, it is not so much the subtle, lurking metaphors as the more direct, almost-preening similes that achieve this: O'Neill is writing about and revelling in writing as she writes. 'Think about how I am telling this story as I tell it,' she seems to whisper. It could not be more enchanting. Laurence Broadhurst teaches English and religion at St. Paul's High School in Winnipeg.
USA Today
4 days ago
- Sport
- USA Today
Former Michigan State basketball star signs contract with Italian basketball team
Former Michigan State basketball star Denzel Valentine has found his next professional home for the 2025-26 basketball season. Valentine will be heading to Venice, Italy, where he will be suiting up for Reyer Venezia of the Lega Basket Serie A. This is going to be the second straight year that Valentine has spent in Italy, playing for Pallacanestro Trieste of the same league last season. Following a career at Michigan State from 2012-2016, where Valentine was a National Player of the Year and an All-American, he was drafted in the first round of the 2016 NBA Draft to the Chicago Bulls. Valentine then spent 2016-2022 in the NBA, but injuries derailed any momentum he could get in the league. Since leaving the NBA, Valentine has spent time in the NBA G League and Australia's NBL, before settling recently in Italy. Contact/Follow us @The SpartansWire on X (formerly Twitter) and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Michigan State news, notes and opinion. You can also follow Cory Linsner on X @Cory_Linsner
Yahoo
21-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Influencer Who Dished Out $33K on 250 Tattoos Reveals How the Transformation Impacts Her Daily Life (Exclusive)
A content creator details her five-year journey to achieving her tattoo "body suit"NEED TO KNOW An Australian woman has gone viral on social media for showing her 250 tattoos, which cover nearly her entire body, from her chest to her feet (and yes, her butt) Over five years, she's spent around $32,600 on her themed ink, which she reveals are done over multiple seven-hour tattooing sessions Speaking about her transformation, she reveals how her appearance has impacted her confidence and everyday interactionsThis woman's love for tattoos is permanent. Melbourne, Australia-based content creator Blue Valentine has garnered a following online for sharing her tattoo journey, which, today, includes around 250 works of art that've cost her $50,000 AUD (which is approximately $33,000 USD). "I always knew I wanted tattoos," says the 28-year-old, who describes herself as "an all-or-nothing kind of person." Still, when she decided to get her first tattoo five years ago, she approached the process slowly and steadily. "I was initially scared I wouldn't be able to handle the pain, as I don't like regular needles or taking blood. I did a small traditional tattoo flower on my ribs, so if I tapped out, I wouldn't have to look at it too much." But that wasn't the case. Despite the "horrible" pain that occurred during that very first session, she wasn't deterred. "As I left the studio, I got over it and booked in my first sleeve about a week later." There's more than what meets the eye with what Valentine calls her "body suit" (because the majority of her lower half — including her chest, stomach and butt — are, in fact, covered in tats). Each sleeve and collage are designed in different themes: Diner, Military, Sailor, Circus, Garage, Western and Vintage. The one thing they have in common? Illustrations inspired by 1950s pin-up culture, which also influences how Valentine dresses day to day. "I knew I wanted to do themes straight away. I like the organization of it. I picked my top themes, assessed which ones had the most images I wanted and they got the larger portions of my body," she explains. "My favorite tattoo is my throat tattoo. [It reads] 'Not your Valentine', Valentine being my last name. I think it's a bold statement and is a strong representation of my personality. My others would be the ones I have representing my family, such as images of my parents [she revealed in a TikTok tattoo tour that she has an depiction of them as "conjoined twins" as a part of her circus-themed sleeve], brother, grandparents and dogs. 'All Bark, All Bite' across my chest is also another favorite of mine," she says. Never miss a story — sign up for to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories. While Valentine's tattoo count may be mind-boggling, she puts thought into every single one she gets. First, she sketches her concepts on an iPad, then gives her moodboard of sorts to her tattoo artists. She's worked with three Australian-based artists, Ben Tuckey, Ben Koopman and Allegra Maeva, over the years (but has never done a tattoo on herself). Then come the time-consuming — and pricey — tattoo shop visits. "I would book six to seven-hour full-day sessions and go either weekly or bi-weekly until we completed whatever sleeve or themed section we were on. I'd then take a month break or so to draw up the next sleeve if I didn't already have it ready. Usually in a full day you could get two big pieces or three medium pieces [completed]. There would also be full-day sessions just focused on filler pieces to close up any gaps, which were usually just free-handed by the artist." She says she's dished out around $800 AUD or $522 USD per session. is now available in the Apple App Store! Download it now for the most binge-worthy celeb content, exclusive video clips, astrology updates and more! Valentine's transformation has cost her much more than money. She tells PEOPLE that her appearance sometimes receives negative responses from people she meets in real life. "Men definitely stare and ask inappropriate questions. I also work in a bar so there's not a night that goes by without some form of harassment and comments made towards me and my tattoos," says Valentine, who works in bar management. "I don't take anyone's opinion of it seriously, as my tattoos are everything I planned out and wanted. I'm very proud of what me and my artists have achieved, and I've become incredibly confident in my skin because of it." She also says she has a loving partner who supports her tattoo journey as she does hers. That means she really (yes, really) doesn't have any regrets about her ink. "I'm so glad I waited until I was 23 to start getting tattooed or, my god, I would have some shockers! Everything was planned and everything worked out the way I envisioned thanks to my artists," she says. The lingering question: Does she have any more room for a few more tattoos? "I only have the bottoms of my feet, face and ears free," she says, though getting her ears done is next on her to-do list. She does have one body part that's absolutely off limits: "I want to keep my face naked." Read the original article on People Solve the daily Crossword
