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Like many, Lamb, when growing up, hoped to be the next great actor. But in late 2005, at age 47, that hadn't happened yet. As the New York Times reported, Lamb went down a different path: "he finds himself with six children, working as a computer programmer for Nationwide Insurance. Mr. Lamb has deep creases under his eyes, skin as pale as copy paper, precious little hair and no acting experience. Any notions he once held of becoming the next Sean Connery died long ago."
And yet, his dream, like him, didn't really die. He registered himself a website, DeadBodyGuy.com (which, unfortunately, is now a morass of tables and frustrating ads) and worked with his wife to create photos of him, dead, in various positions. (An spill down the stairs can be seen above.) Lamb's hope was that the website would spread virally throughout the Internet, ultimately catching the eye of a movie producer or two. Here's another picture of Lamb, dead, to help demonstrate that he isn't just a staircase-death expert; he was really good at being mostly dead.
Lamb's website worked. As the CBC reported, "six weeks [after he launched his website], his story landed on the front page of The New York Times. He then started landing interviews on CNN, Good Morning America and The Today Show about what he was doing." That last appearance caught the eyes of a TV producer, who invited Lamb to play a corpse in an episode of "What I Like About You." While uncredited, Lamb appeared on-screen for the first time dead. (Note that the interviews with CNN, GMA, and TODAY featured him alive, which wasn't his goal.) But with his limp foot in the door, more opportunities came his way.
As of 2019, Lamb now has fourteen film credits to his name, all of which are for laying there still, barely (and officially, not) breathing, eyes slightly ajar. And yes, in some of them (most notably, perhaps, the 2010 Danny Aiello comedy "Stiffs"), his name appears in the credits, just as he always wanted.
Books of 2020 - as chosen by Irish authors
In the Irish Times Martin Doyle collects The best books of 2020: As chosen by Irish authors -- including Roddy Doyle, Anne Enright, John Banville, and Colm Tóibín.
I HOPE SO: Can we make bones heal faster?
The report on Upskilling and Investing in People explores how governments are upskilling and investing in people in innovative ways. This includes investing in the public as a critical resource, i.e. investing in the digital, cognitive and socio-emotional skills of all citizens and residents as well as upskilling the public service to unlock the potential of government, including skills in innovation, collaboration and digital transformation.
In the Irish Times Martin Doyle reports that Ireland's bestselling books of 2020 revealed.
It seems kind of early to make this kind of claim -- "Figures are for sales until the end of November", and aren't these last few weeks of the year among the biggest of the years, sales-wise ? -- but at least the list gives actual sales numbers, which are always interesting to see.
Selling 55,039 copies was good enough for the top place -- Where the Crawdads Sing, by Delia Owens -- while 20,646 was enough to get you in the top 10.
Mashable: “The Wildlife Photography Awards really is the gift that keeps on giving. A couple of months back we had the contest’s highly commended entries, then we had the overall winners, and now it’s time for the People’s Choice category. On Tuesday, London’s Natural History Museum — the organisation behind the competition — released a 25-strong shortlist, which ranges from the adorable and the amusing to the dark and disturbing (fair warning, there are a handful of entries right at the bottom of this list that show animals that are either hurt or in captivity — they serve to highlight issues surrounding cruel human treatment of animals, hunting, and the need for conservation but they may well be upsetting, so tread with caution).The following images have been shortlisted from 49,000 entries…”
25 wildlife photos that show nature at its most beautiful, weird, and brutal - Mashable