Supermodel gives birth to daughter

Supermodel givesbirth to daughter
NEW YORK -- Just in time for Mother's Day, Heidi Klum is a mom. The 30-year-old German supermodel gave birth to daughter Leni in New York on Tuesday, according to her representatives.
On Klum's Web site, Leni was listed as weighing 3,750 grams, just over 8 pounds. The baby's father is Flavio Briatore, managing director of Renault's Formula One team. Klum, who has appeared in Sports Illustrated magazine's swimsuit issue, separated from her husband of five years, celebrity hairstylist Ric Pipino, in November 2002.
Madonna seeks exceptionto law favoring walkers
LONDON -- Not in my back yard, says Madonna.
Lawyers for the Material Girl argued Wednesday that walkers should not be allowed to traipse across her $11 million country estate of Ashcombe House in Wiltshire, southern England.
Madonna and her husband, film director Guy Ritchie, are disputing their obligations under a new law designed to give ramblers access to open land across Britain.
The couple -- listed as Mr. and Mrs. G. Ritchie in legal papers relating to the case -- believe that allowing public access to their land would breach their human rights by infringing on their privacy.
Madonna and Ritchie didn't attend Wednesday's hearing.
Lawyer David Elvin told an inquiry held by the Planning Inspectorate that the couple are contesting 17 parcels of land identified by the Countryside Agency as open countryside. The government-funded agency has decided that 100 acres of the couple's 1,200-acre retreat should be designated a public walkway. Elvin said the agency had agreed that five of the contested areas had been wrongly classified, but the remaining 12 pieces of land were still in dispute.
Stephen Pasterfield, representing the Countryside Agency, said there should be no special consideration for famous people.
'Friends' finale makesband popular again
DULUTH, Minn. -- Phil Solem didn't want to be known as a one-hit wonder, but it will be hard to think otherwise when the final episode of "Friends" airs Thursday and viewers hear him sing the show's theme song.
Solem and his band, The Rembrandts, were approached by a "Friends" producer in 1994. They wrote 45 seconds of material with five other writers, intending to stay anonymous. But fans of "I'll Be There for You" had different ideas.
"A radio guy in Nashville -- I don't know if I love him or hate him -- looped the 45 seconds into a three-minute song, and people were all over it," Solem, a native of Duluth, said from his home in Sherman Oaks, Calif.
"Our record label said we had to finish the song and record it. There was no way to get out of it," said Solem, who has written reams of music in his 47 years.
Without the song, The Rembrandts may not have sold as many albums, Solem said. But there was a downside: "We lost a lot of hard-core, original fans because they thought we'd decided to take the easy way, but we felt forced to be press monkeys."
After the "Friends" buzz waned for The Rembrandts, the band broke up. When they reunited, the music industry wasn't interested. But the "Friends" finale put them back in the spotlight.
On Tuesday, the band released a compact disc of rerecorded greatest hits, "Choice Picks," on Solem's label, Akee Records.
Notable death
Felix Haug, half of the band Double that had a worldwide hit with the song "The Captain of Her Heart" in the 1980s, died Saturday from a heart attack, his family said. He was 52.
Today's birthdays
Baseball Hall-of-Famer Willie Mays is 73. Senate Banking Chairman Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) is 70. Rock singer Bob Seger is 59. Singer Jimmie Dale Gilmore is 59. Actor Ben Masters is 57. Actor Gregg Henry is 52. British Prime Minister Tony Blair is 51. TV game show host Tom Bergeron is 49. Actor George Clooney is 43. Actor Clay O'Brien is 43. Actress Roma Downey is 41. Rock singer-musician Tony Scalzo (Fastball) is 40. Rock musician Mark Bryan (Hootie and the Blowfish) is 37. Rock musician Chris Shiflett (Foo Fighters) is 33.