The Godfather: Peter Corris on beggars and buskers
Walking on either side of King Street, Newtown, say from Missenden Road to the railway station, it’s a rare day that you don’t encounter a beggar or a busker or both. They are a feature that helps to give the precinct its character. Their variety is considerable –...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on Buddy Holly
For no particular reason I can think of I recently experienced a wish to listen to Buddy Holly. I’d had some singles and a vinyl ‘best of’, but that was a long time ago. I went to the HUM CD and DVD shop in Newtown thinking I’d have to order an album in. As everyone...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on coming to terms with blindness
Readers will to have to forgive me for returning to the subject of blindness. Understandably, given that I’m legally though not functionally blind, it’s one of my preoccupations. My ophthalmologist has assured me I will not go completely blind, but he hasn’t told me...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on taxi drivers
All users of taxis have stories about the drivers – how some are rude and some polite; how some get to the destination quickly and efficiently and others dither around not knowing the way at all, let alone the best way. GPS should help in theory, but not all drivers...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on suits
I know of few more ludicrous sights than a clutch of AFL football commentators, mostly solidly built ex-players, lined up on a football ground at half time and all wearing grey suits, white shirts and ties. Some discussion programs, such as Foxtel’s League Teams,...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on House of Cards
Most days I watch a film on television, occasionally two. They don’t have any marked effect on me as far as I can tell. The poor or indifferent ones I forget about immediately; the better ones I might think about for a day or two, enjoy remembering a scene or a line,...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on Paris
Reading habits differ; I know people who read only fiction and some who read only non-fiction. I know of one person who reads one of each in alternate reading sessions. My pattern is to read them in turn and in that way I’ve just finished two recent books about Paris:...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on the paperless office
Back when computers suddenly appeared on every desk it was commonly thought that they heralded the advent of the paperless office. Now I think it’s generally accepted that the opposite has been the case. With copy paper so cheap and printers so inexpensive, efficient...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on musicals
When I was young, back in the late 1940s and early 1950s. I went often to Hollywood musical films, at first with my parents, later with my older sister or friends. I saw a great many – Annie Get your Gun, Oklahoma, Luxury Liner, Kiss Me Kate, Singin’ in the Rain,...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on enemies
In many crime novels, after the body of the victim has been taken away, the investigator’s first question is: ‘Did he have any enemies that you know of?’ Replies can vary from, ‘None that I recall’ to ‘Where do you want me to start? How long have you got? I was set to...
The Godfather: Peter Corris on Toby Wilkinson’s Egypt
In the mid-1980s I visited Egypt, briefly. I did the usual things – spent some time in Cairo and Alexandria, saw the pyramids and the Sphinx, went up the Nile by boat to Luxor and Karnak and did some temple gazing. The monuments left me cold and, after reading Toby...
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