HOMЯ

Imagine

You call a good friend and ask her if she’s free to come over later that evening. “There’s something I want to talk about,” you say. “Don’t worry. It’s nothing too serious, but it might take a little while to explain.”

Later that night she stops by.

You have something cued up on your TV to watch. It’s an episode of the Simpsons. “I know this is strange,” you say, “but I think watching it will help explain what I want to say.”

You watch episode 9 from Season 12, entitled HOMЯ.

In the episode, it’s revealed that Homer has had a crayon stuck in his brain since childhood. When the crayon is removed he becomes much more intelligent which strengthens his relationship with Lisa, but his intelligence becomes a detriment to the other relationships in his life. In the end he has the crayon re-inserted into his brain.

At the end of the episode you say to your friend, “We’ve known each other for a long time and you’ve been a great friend. But I think it’s time for me to make some changes. Changes that are probably going to come between us and potentially prevent us from connecting in the way we have in the past.”

She will be confused about what you’re getting at, and what it has to do with this Simpsons episode.

You sigh. “It’s been fun. Honestly. I’ve really appreciated your friendship.”

With that you close your eyes, tilt your head back, reach into one of your nostrils, and with a bit of wincing and cringing, you slowly pull out a crayon and drop it on the couch next to her.

You blink your eyes rapidly a few times.

“Good heavens,” you say.

You seem to notice your friend as if you forgot she was there, you quickly assess her—not pleased with what you see. “Ah, yes. I think it’s best if you go now. I’ll be in touch if I have the need for your fellowship in the future. Good day.”

You guide her toward the door. The implication is, of course, that now that you don’t have a crayon stuck in your brain, you’re not going to want to be spending much time with this person.

Method

This is a bad idea that you shouldn’t do. This discussion is for entertainment purposes only. Go sue someone else.

Okay so it’s just the human blockhead trick but with a crayon instead of a nail.

Now, here’s the thing… I’m not even sure if this can be done. That is, I don’t know if you can do the blockhead trick with something as thick as a crayon. I’ve heard of people doing it with pens/pencils but I don’t know how safe or dangerous that may be. If a crayon is too big, then just use one of those nails they use. The premise will still be understood: You’ve had something in your brain for a long time which has allowed you to be dumb enough to connect with this other person.

The basic idea for this presentation comes from reader, I.M. I was impressed that anyone could come up with any sort of immersive presentation for the human blockhead trick.

That is one of the most “look at me,” magician-centric tricks of all time. I don’t even know if you can call it a trick. it’s a stunt. But I’m not sure if people are supposed to fooled by it in any way. People surely understand the nail isn’t going into anything in your head, right? I mean, if you hammered it into your forehead, that would be one thing, but sticking it up your nose? I’m not 100% sure what the effect is supposed to be (if there is supposed to be one).

In this thread on the Magic Cafe, noted magic genius, Djvirtualreality, says:

I’m sure that’s true. But what percentage of that “flipping” is due to amazement? Are people ever in awe of this or just grossed out? I honestly don’t know because I don’t do the trick. But I feel like I could get at least 75% of the reaction of the human blockhead by just telling someone to look in my nose and then rooting around in there with my pinky finger.

Regardless, I think I.M., has hit on something here with his presentation. If you want to do the typical geek stunt, then it makes sense to perform it the traditional way (in and out). However, if you want to do something a little more absurdist and potentially intriguing, then I would focus on a presentation where you just put it in, or just pull it out.

If you want to push the presentation further, when your friend is on her way out, pull out a basket of mixed-up Rubik’s Cubes (that have been set up in one of those arrangements that allows for a quick solve) and just start solving them one by one

Mailbag #14

I just read your post about presentation vs. context. I think the central idea you're getting across is one of method vs story. Humans are incredibly effective at storytelling. It's baked into our DNA and a way for us to engage our memory and other senses to get our point/ideas across to our listener. Storytelling is quite literally a survival skill for our species and it's no wonder when used in magic, makes our audience focus and engage. Your example about Ghosts etc. Is a very involved story that an active participant would engage in and remember because it is being told - as a story - something we have evolved to detect as a pattern and automatically engage with. So, I think the moral of this posts story ( :p) is: if you want an audience to remember your performance - tell them a story with a trick embedded within. If you want your audience to forget - present them a trick ;).

Here are some really cool articles that support your hypothesis:

https://www.wired.com/2011/03/why-do-we-tell-stories/
https://www.edutopia.org/article/neuroscience-narrative-and-memory
https://time.com/5043166/storytelling-evolution/

—BG

The problem with using "storytelling" with magicians is they say, "Ah, I know. I'll tell a story about a blue-backed card who got jealous and became a red-backed card." Or something like that.

What you want is to create a "story" where the spectator is a "character" taking part in something

“Presentation” is about adding a story to a trick. “Context” is about making the trick a story.

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I've watched Brian Connor's Big Brother. I imagine that you know it because he talks about you but it's basically the trick of coding a card to your Google Assistant.

My question was: do you have any justification if anyone tries to make his/her Google Assistant name a card in the same way and getting no results? That is the only weak point I can find. —JP

I don’t own it, so I can’t really comment on if what I’m suggesting would work with the method, but I think the simple answer is that your presentation can't be "this is something that all phones can do.” It has to be your particular phone/google assistant that is compromised/modified in some way.

• You "hacked" it

• The government is spying on you specifically and has messed with your phone.

• You have a beta version of the upcoming operating system that has some strange features.

• Your phone was struck by lightning and is acting weird.

• All your electronics are acting up in a "Maximum Overdrive" type of scenario.

Or something along those lines.

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[Re: A recent question on close-up pads.)

Small-size mouse pads are usually big enough to double as closeup pads. I get them for five bucks at the computer store. The non-skid rubber black ones are my favorite. If you’re sitting close enough to your desktop computer you can grab the mouse pad and say, “here this makes it easier” before performing a trick on it. Or at a cafe you can pull one out of your backpack and identify it as a mouse pad.—CW

In the right situation I think that would fly. In some situations, carrying around a mousepad would be as strange (if not stranger) as carrying around a pad to do card tricks on.

My general rule—if I have a trick that is surface dependent—is to move the performance of that trick to an adequate surface, rather than moving a surface to the trick. This makes perfect sense in an amateur situation.

Mattresses, couch cushions, blankets, carpeting, yoga mats, etc. Keep your eye out and you’ll find other “natural” close-up pad surfaces.

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Talking about robbers entering the front door/back door/etc using different parts of the deck is a bit clunky. I think it's a bit nicer to say they're robbing a skyscraper and they're robbing different floors. Then you say the police arrived so the robbers all ran up to the roof (riffle deck to indicate this) and they ziplined/helicoptered away. That's how I was shown it as a kid. —KM

Hmmm. I see your point, but I doubt anyone gets too hung-up on that. “Hey! This isn’t very bank-like!” Although your version certainly ups the ante on the action quotient. A skyscraper! Zip-lines! I’m into that. Hell, I’d encourage someone to do a full 109 minute version that completely re-enacts the 2018 film, Skyscraper, starring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson

I myself am working on a version where the deck is an actress in a gang-bang porno and the four Jacks are the men in the film. “One inserted himself in her bottom. One in her vagina. One titty fucked her. And one went in her mouth. Just then, the director said, ‘We only have this Airbnb for two more minutes, let’s finish up!’ And they all… jacked-off…on…her…face.”

[Hold for applause.]

Codified

Here’s a trick I did with a wingman friend of mine when we were out with a couple non-magician friends last week.

If you were to do it the way I did it, it requires you and the person you’re performing with to have a particular learned skill, but there is an easier way to do it as well that I’ll give at the end.

Here’s what it looks like. We were at a Cafe to get lunch and we had brought our laptops along to get some work done afterwards. We’re all freelance/self-employed, so this is a pretty regular occurrence for us. I was there with my “wingman” Jeff and our friends Emily and Charles.

Jeff is not really a magician—he doesn’t read up on magic or follow it online—but he likes learning two-person code tricks. I’ve taught him probably a dozen different systems over the years. And while the majority of them have been forgotten, we have a few different things that we perform regularly enough and are simple enough that we can easily go into them with no preparation.

It’s not hard to find a person like Jeff in your life. Just look for someone who appreciates cleverness and likes a little attention. Your wingmen don’t have to have the same level of investment in magic as you do.

I tell Charles and Emily that I’m working on a new trick with Jeff and we send him to the other side of the Cafe for a minute. I ask Emily to name a one-syllable word. She says, “Lump.” I have a deck of cards with me and ask her to shuffle it.. I take the deck back and one-by-one I take cards from the top of the deck and hold them out towards Emily as if I’m feeling for some kind of vibration. Some of those cards are dealt in a row in front of her face-up, others face-down, and some are discarded altogether.

I beckon Jeff to come back over and he waves his hand over the spread of cards. He looks at Emily and says, ‘You’re thinking of the word ‘Lump.’”

They found this modestly impressive. Obviously I had coded the word in the cards, but how?

I showed them that I’d used Morse code. The red cards were “dots,” the black cards were “dashes” and the face-down cards indicated the end of a letter.

Here is “Lump” coded in that way.

I reset the deck to its normal condition.

“That’s sort of the ‘training wheels’ version. We’ve been practicing to get a lot faster.” I ask Emily to whisper another word to me.

I take the deck and flip one half face-up and shuffle it into the other half. Not quite as fast as a normal shuffle, but relatively briskly. I bring my face down so I can study the sides of the deck as I shuffle. As you might if you were learning riffle-stacking. I then give it a few overhand shuffle chops, cut it into a few packets and reassemble. I take the deck and hold it at one end and flip the other end like a flip-book for Jeff as he looks into the deck.

This all happens very quickly. Far too quickly for me to have actually stacked the cards. And even if I had, there would be no way for Jeff to actually decipher the pattern in a quick riffle of the end of the packet. Right?

And yet, after a couple moments of thought, he says, “Were you thinking of the word Dance?”

She was.

I’ve already started resetting the deck when they ask to see it again.

Emily gives me another word. I split the deck and shuffle it face-up into face down. Even faster this time. Some overhand shuffling and then I cut a few packets around the table and quickly reassemble the jumbled mess.

I flip the cards towards Jeff. He squints. “I missed it,” he says. “One more time.”

I do it again. He shakes his head. “Sorry, I’m not getting anything.”

I spread the deck on the table. All the cards are facing the same way. “Shoot. The deck broke,” I say.

Method

I particularly like the structure of this trick. Tonally it’s all over the place, but at the same time, each phase naturally follows the one that precedes it.

Phase One: You show them a minor effect and expose it for real.

Phase Two: You then do the same effect but in a much more impossible way.

Phase Three: You supposedly are going to repeat phase two, but it veers off into a magical/absurdist direction.

Depending on your point of view, you could see this as an elaborate way to get into Triumph. Or you could see the Triumph part as an out-of-left-field kicker ending.

To do this as I did it, you and your wingman need to know Morse code. It’s easy. It takes under a half hour to learn. Invite your friend over, get some food, and make it your goal to learn it in an evening. I find having a visual guide helpful in learning it, so you can associate the dots and dashes with the shape of the letter.

So, Phase One, you just do for real.

With Phase Two, you’re going to actually use Morse Code as a method where you pretend to use Morse Code. As you shuffle the deck you tap the word on your partners foot with your foot.

Phase Three is just any Triumph handling you want that comes close to mimicking what you did in Phase Two.

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Alternate ending: If you want you could have your wingman successfully receive the word in the third phase. Then you could say something like, “This was a method prisoners of war used to send messages to other prisoners during World War II. Passing a note to another prisoner could get you in trouble, but passing them a deck of cards was perfectly innocent. Unless a guard was to grab it and spread through it and notice the arrangement of the cards. Then you’d have to come up with a way to ‘erase’ the message.” At that point you could focus on the just-mixed deck and do some magical action that apparently resets the deck to normal.

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Okay, you don’t want to learn Morse Code. You could use something like the Thought Transmitter Pro or another type of peek device. Your spectator writes the word down (while you watch—you’re supposed to know the word) and at some point you deliver the peek to your partner. Then all the Morse Code stuff is just completely fake instead of only partially fake.

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Being able to tap out words in Morse code is a surprisingly powerful tool. And having someone (or being someone) who doesn’t always need to take credit for the trick, is also very powerful. And combining those two tools is particularly satisfying. There’s a little bit of a dance to the methodology that feels extra good to pull off.

For example, picture this… There is an envelope on the table. A spectator secretly writes down any word. You open up the envelope and dump out a folded piece of paper and it has the word they wrote down.

The method? You peek the word. You tap it to your accomplice across the table. They write the word down on a card in their lap as all attention is on you and the spectator. They fold the card and toss it under the table into your lap. As you reach for the envelope with one hand, the other snags the card from your lap. You then apparently dump the card from the envelope, either by pulling it out from behind it or in a shuttle pass type of dump.

You can also tap the letters with your index and middle finger on the table top (index for dot, middle for dash). It will look like you’re just randomly drumming your fingers if anyone notices it all but. But now you can signal words to someone a few seats away at the bar. Someone who your spectator might not even realize is someone you know. So they think they’ve written down a word in secret, but in actuality you do know the word as does a third party they don’t know about. And your friend can be writing it on the bathroom wall or out in front of the bar in sidewalk chalk, or keying it into your car door or whatever.

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This effect grew out of a much more difficult effect that fooled people intensely but didn’t have the other elements I look for in a trick.

A spectator freely shuffles a deck of cards. You spread the cards in front of them and ask them to look at the cards as they go by and to allow a one syllable word to come to their mind while they look at cards. They either say the word out loud or write it down and you peek it.

You deal the cards onto the table and ask them to stop you whenever they want.

You spread those dealt cards face up. Your friend comes in. He doesn’t need to get close to you or look at you. You could even leave the room before he returns. He looks at the spread of cards (from the deck the spectator freely shuffled and the number of cards they freely stopped at (no timing force)) and he can immediately name the word the spectator thought of.

Method

1. The spectator shuffles the deck.

2. As you spread the cards for them, you cull out the red cards during the first half of the spread. You don’t need to do it through the whole spread. When you’re done and you push the cards together and turn the deck over, you’ll have a bunch of red cards on top, a bunch of mixed cards, and a bunch of black cards on the bottom.

3. They name the word they’re thinking of (or you peek it).

4. Here’s where it gets difficult, but doable. The spectator is thinking of a one syllable word. Most of those are going to be 5 letters or less. You are going to deal the cards onto the table by dealing from the top and bottom of the deck and you are going to stack them in red/black Morse Code as you do. Here is my best tip to make this doable: Don’t think of “dot/dash” and don’t think of “red/black.” Think of “up/down.” Up = short/red/normal deal. Down = long/black/bottom deal

5. Break up the dealing of the letters with some talking. Deal one or two letters at a time. So if they say the word FLAT. You would deal out an F (Up, Up, Down, Up)

   “I’m going to deal through deck in a pile.”

   Deal an L (Up, Down, Up, Up)

   “Just one at a time like this.”

   Knowing A and T are short (the most used letters in Morse Code are the easiest to signal). I would deal them together.

   Deal an A and a T (Up, Down, Down)

   “And you stop me at any point.” Or you can give the deck to them and have them continue dealing.

6. When they’re done, you take the pile and flip it over and spread it. You want to have a fairly even spread initially. But then, in the process of making sure all the cards are showing, you’re going to put a little extra gap between the cards that represent the start of one letter and the beginning of another.

7. When your friend comes in, he just ignores any cards after the last letter.

This fooled people badly, but I couldn’t come up with a really great presentation for it. What I tried going with was the idea that a shuffled deck is like tossed tea leaves and that the way the cards are distributed can tell us things. The idea being that the spectator was somehow able to intuit this word that was baked into this particular order in which they shuffled the deck and that my friend could then look at the spread and recognize the word as well.

It was okay, but not worth it for the effort required and the need of someone else to be involved.

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So then I started doing a solo version. They think of a word and again, they name it out loud or write it down and I peek it. They shuffle the deck. I spread the cards and ask them if they see a pattern. They say “No.” I deal some cards into a pile on the table. “I think I may have seen a pattern.” Pause. Deal a few more cards. “I’m not 100% sure.” Deal a few more. “That should probably be enough.”

I spread the cards face up and then tell them about Morse Code and I bring up a translation page on my computer or phone.

“Here we have a red card, a black card, another red and a black. If red is short and black is long we have short-long-short-long. That would be a P in Morse Code. See? Did your word start with a P?”

I then go on to show them that the rest of their word is spelled out in the cards. So here the trick is they thought of a word, shuffled a deck of cards, and somehow managed to shuffle the cards into a Morse Code representation of the word they were thinking of. And they don’t even know Morse Code.

This too felt impossible to people, but didn’t really connect as I would want it to. I think it’s a little too dense as a subject matter for a trick.

But you may find a way to streamline it, or find the right audience for it.

Presentation vs Context: Clarification

A few people asked for clarification on the distinction between Presentation and Context. Part of the confusion might be baked into my terminology. The problem is I'm using those words to mean specific things, but they are also words that I have to use in a more general sense in my writing as well. Perhaps it's just a matter of capitalizing them when I'm talking about them in the specific sense that I'm using and not capitalizing them when I'm using them in the general sense of the word. I’ll give that a shot.

The concept I'm trying to capture is these three ways of presenting a trick.

1. You can do a trick with no story element at all. It's just a description of what they're seeing happen. "The card goes in the middle of the deck and now it's on top.”

Or

2. You can dress up the trick a little with a story element that is put on top of the trick. Remember when you used to be able to buy "skins" for your iPod? That's kind-of how I think of Presentation. Ideally it adds something to trick, but it’s inessential.

Or

3. You can place a trick in a different Context that is something other than a straight "magic performance." It's a story that's that's taking place here and now.

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Here's an example of each with the same trick.

1. Unadorned effect: You place four jacks in four different parts of the deck, then deal them all off the top of the deck.

2. Same effect with a Presentation: This is one of the first tricks that ever blew my mind as a little kid. A friend of the family performed it for me. It's a classic. The four jacks are "bank robbers." The deck is the "bank." One thief goes in the back door, another the door on the left side, another the door on the right side, and the last goes in the front door. The cops show up and all the thieves run out the front door (top of the deck).

3. Same effect with a Context: You talk about some gambling techniques you've been working on and ask for their help to see if you're "flashing" at all. You take the four jacks and put one on the bottom, one 2/3rds of the way down, one 1/3rd of the way down, and one second from the top (in actuality, all jacks are now on top). You square the deck and talk a little about second dealing and bottom dealing and center dealing. "They're all really hard, but with practice you can learn any one of them. It’s all about finding the rhythm. The really hard thing is to do those sorts of false deals in succession—one after the other. Usually they require different grips. But that's what I've been practicing. It's hell on your wrist." You pick up the deck, breathe deep, and quickly deal off four cards. "Ah, shiiiiitttttttt!" you say, as you bend your wrist back and forth and clench and unclench your fingers. "I need to work on the hand strength. But did it look like they were coming off the top?" you ask as you flip over the jacks.

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One way to identify Presentation vs. Context is that Presentations often are symbolic stories. "The jacks are bank robbers. The deck is a bank." Things are representing other things.

In a Context, things are what they are (for the most part).

In general, I prefer Context over Presentation. And that's because I find it easier to make a context somewhat engrossing. But this isn't intended to be a value judgment. My point in this series of posts is to identify the characteristics of Context vs. Presentation so you can manipulate them depending on what experience you're attempting to deliver.

(Personally, for the four jack trick, I'd be more likely to use the classic Presentation mentioned above than the Context I gave, because I don't generally use Contexts that are focused on my "incredible skill" (unless it's clearly ridiculous). So if I were to do this trick it would be with the bank robber presentation. But not for adults. It’s a trick I’d save for kids. I have better stuff for adults.)

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So, going back to where I started this post, to help clarify this concept, this is really just an extension of something I’ve been discussing since the beginning of this site: the difference between the amateur style and the professional style.

If you want it to feel like a “performance,” then you will focus on Presentation and presentational elements: patter, scripted jokes, wardrobe, routining, etc. This is what a professional—or someone performing in a professional style—will do. If you’re putting on a performance you don’t need to worry about Context because you are already doing the trick in the context of a performance.

If you want it to feel like a social interaction, then you will focus on Context. Context is heavily affected by your relationship to the spectator(s) and where you are performing the trick. But ultimately Context is defined by Why you say you’re showing them the trick. A context is just a reason to show people a trick other than, “I’m trying to entertain you.” The context does not need to be believed or believable. You offering them an immersive fiction, not trying to play a practical joke on them.

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I will put Presentation vs. Context in an analogy you will all understand: hiring a prostitute.

If you pay a meth-head $5 for a blowjob, that’s like a trick without presentation or context. It’s just the unadorned effect. You’re just trying to drain your nuts.

If you hire a $200 hooker off Craigslist and she shows up in a sexy outfit and teases you with a lap-dance first, then that’s like a trick with some presentation. Sure, the point is still to blow your load, but here she’s added some presentational/performance elements to it.

If you pay a woman $800 to act like your girlfriend for the evening, she may show up in her pajama bottoms and a hoodie and you may watch The Great British Bake Off for 2 hours. And then she may give you effectively the same BJ as you got for $5 from the meth-head, but here it’s in a girlfriend Context. In your head you know this isn’t “real,” but that doesn’t prevent it from potentially being a much more affecting experience due to the Context.

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Finally, here are some of the other terms I considered using before settling on Presentation vs Context, which may give further insight in regards to how I’m using the those terms.

Trick-Focused Presentations vs Story-Focused Presentations

Too wordy.

Superficial Presentations vs Immersive Presentations

I didn't like what could be seen as an implied judgment in the word "superficial,” even though that’s not how I’d be using the word. I didn’t want to have to explain that each time.

Third-Person Presentations vs First-Person Presentations

I think this one has value as it focuses on the audience's role. Are they watching a story (Presentation/Performance), or are they part of the story (Context/Interaction).

Diegetic vs. Non-Diegetic Presentations

This was probably me trying to be too clever—playing off the concept of diegetic and non-diegetic sound in movies. Is the presentation part of the fictional world you're creating, or is it something added on top to emphasize certain elements of the trick?

I think most of you are probably pretty clear on the subject. If you’re not, you will be after I finish up this series.

Dustings of Woofle #15

My (32F) husband (36M) wants to start a 'restaurant for magicians', and it is tearing our family apart pic.twitter.com/j3CuAeS23j

— relationships.txt (@redditships) September 19, 2019

This was making the rounds on twitter and in my email box last week.

I have a hard time believing it's legitimate because it's so fucking stupid. I hope it's real though.

Jacob S.W. wrote me with a great idea:

Actually starting this restaurant in real life would be insane, but pretending that somebody else has started it could be fun. That is, I tell my kids about a bizarre new restaurant, which has secretly been set up to make it easy for people to do magic tricks. Then I take them to some ordinary, non-magic restaurant, and I've got a built-in imp for everything. “The forks here are charged with negative ions. You know that mint they gave me when we came in? Positively charged. Now every time I move a body part near a fork, it moves. Don’t tell the waiter I told you how it works!” Etc.

I think that's a great context to show some tricks, especially if someone in your life saw that tweet and sent it to you.

"Oh, those restaurants already exist. I mean, not exactly like that. I don't think you would open up a restaurant for the sole purpose of catering to magicians who wanted to perform there. But there is a secret network of about 150 or so restaurants across the country that do offer the service. There's one...gee... about 45 minutes from here. Do you want to go sometime? You just can't tell anyone that I told you this."

You can then go and claim there is special cutlery [spoon bending] and that the waiters will always name a specific card so you can have that card reversed in the deck in order to impress people. [Invisible deck] "Go ahead, point to any waiter and I'll wave them over to name a card. It will be funny. They’ll act totally confused by it. They’re good actors here.”

The concept is almost believable. When something like this is "almost believable," I like to push it about 20% further into unbelievability.

"Okay, here’s something I didn’t tell you before you started eating your eggplant parmesan because I didn’t want you to freak out about it. One thing you can do here is call ahead and ask them to mix something—and let me be clear here, it’s not LSD, okay?—you can ask them to mix a non-toxic, LSD-adjacent, chemical in the food of the person you’re dining with…. Calm down! It’s not a big deal. It’s such a low dose that it’s practically nothing. But it can cause suggestibility and hallucinatory behavior in people.” Follow that with any sort of visual magic trick.

---

“And I do bill to lemon!”

Thanks to Lee W. for sending this along to me from the reviews for Haunted at Penguin. I don't know why I find this so funny. I guess just the manner of throwing it out there with no context like bill to lemon is just obviously the standard against which everything should be judged.

If you want to delight me, please use that phrase often in the future, when writing on the Cafe, in your Yelp reviews, or when arguing with the wife.

I'm not a fan of Bill to Lemon, because it's kind of the epitome of meaningless impossibility. I know it gets a fine reaction but there's not much there to really capture someone's imagination. No one walks out thinking, "Man... I wish I could make my money go into a lemon! Is it possible? Or will it forever be just a beautiful dream?"

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If you know Ken Weber please tell him I said “thank you" for his kind email and “no, I don't think we've ever met.”

(I know this is a wildly inefficient way to communicate with someone. I tried to reply to his email but it just bounced back to me. His email address came through as a weird string of numbers and letters @outlook.com. I can't imagine that was his normal email address. Maybe he used some kind of anti-spam one-time email address because he thought I was going to sign him up on my mailing list. I don’t have a mailing list, so that’s not a concern.)

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Here's a perfect looking Yento box from friend-of-the-site, George K.

He writes:

I did the Yento presentation for my 11-year-old niece for her birthday. (I used the Crystal Cleaver.) She was super into it. Such a fun and great idea for presenting magic. I'm pretty sure I'll be doing this every year with her from here on out.

This is one of my favorite presentational conceits as well. Not only because spectators seem to dig it, but also because iit gave me an excuse to go back and re-examine the Tenyo catalog for effects that I could work into the framework. (And buy a bunch of Tenyo junk in the process.)

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I don’t share too many personal details on this site, but I just have to tell someone about this date I had last night.

I went with this woman to a new tapas restaurant about 15 minutes from my place. The sexual tension was palpable. Not long after we sat down, she shifted around the seat of the curved booth so she was right next to me, her hand on my thigh and gradually inching upwards as we talked.

When it was time to leave, we couldn’t pay the check fast enough.

At every stoplight on the way back to my place our hands and mouths were all over each other.

And when we finally got inside, our clothes started coming off before the door was even closed.

We kissed and undressed and stumbled our way to the bed where we made love for hours, climaxing together on multiple occasions as we gazed into each other’s eyes and each other’s souls. She told me it was the most amazing thing she’s ever experienced. And I do bill to lemon.

Mailbag #13

I've been thinking about your recent advice about context. I've always been the kind of social magician that waits for someone to ask me to do something rather than charging ahead; that's something I need to work on, and your ideas have helped. As much as I like it when someone seeks me out and brings someone for me to meet, they often say something like "can you show us a card trick?" So right off the bat the experience is capped as a "card trick" in their minds. Some older blog posts hint at ways to pivot from this starting point, but I'm wondering if you have any advice about this specific situation. —CC

This is obviously related very much to the subject of my last series of posts on transitioning. And my advice is going to be similar.

Here is what I would do:

Someone says, “Can you show us a card trick?”

Me: “Uhmmmm… yeah… I think.” I don’t want to say “yes” or we’re locked into a card trick. But I don’t want to be someone who says, “No” immediately either. So my attitude would suggest that yes, I’d like to show them a trick, but there is something preventing that.

“Actually, I have to be honest… I’m way out of practice. I haven’t really been doing any card tricks in a few weeks. Maybe another time?”

I want to push and pull a little here. I want to mess with their emotions a bit. It’s not quite an emotional rollercoaster. We’re talking about a magic trick, not waiting on the results of an AIDS test. It’s more of an emotional mechanical horsey.

“Actually… you two would be perfect for this thing I’ve been working on. It’s not really a ‘magic trick’ in the sense you’re thinking. It’s a little weirder. Can we try it?”

That’s how I’d approach it.

1. Tentatively agree

2. Decline

3. Transition to something else

If they come in asking for a card trick, they’re not expecting anything too weird. If you say you can’t give them a card trick but you can give them something sort of similar but a little stranger, then you’re telling them to set their expectations aside. I still probably wouldn’t go into something wayyyy out there. But you could definitely shift into something with a significantly different feel than “a card trick.”

You’re not giving them exactly what they asked for, but hopefully what you end up doing is as good or better. I think that would be a satisfying experience for them.

(Imagine your friend said, “Let’s drop by my friend Anna’s house. I want to say hi. Oh, and she makes amazing caramels.” You arrive at the house and your friend says, “Could we get some caramels?” Anna says, “Uhm… sure… actually… I think I’m all out. I haven’t really been doing the candy-making much recently. I’ve shifted to baking. I just made some cupcakes. Would you like one?” You’d have to be a real piece of shit to say, “But I asked for caramels!”)

After you’re done showing them whatever it is you want to show them, you can then say. “Next time we get together I promise to show you a card trick.”

This does two things:

First, it builds a little anticipation by planting a seed for “next time.”

Second, and very importantly in my opinion: It establishes a bifurcation of your interests between “magic tricks” and “some weirder sorts of things.” This means, in the future, you’re free to do any sort of thing you want. You can do sponge balls, or a gambling demonstration, or a “Traditional Apache Summoning of the Dead Ceremony.” If you have something really cool to show someone that feels like a trick, that’s fine. If you have something that is perhaps a little more intense and hits on a different level, that’s fine too. You’ve established an interest in both types of things so you’re not locked into any one thing.

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I’m trying to reconcile a couple things. In your “Transitioning” series and elsewhere on your site, you’ve made the point that you want them to understand that the trick is fiction. But then in other posts you’ve talked about The Smear Technique where you try and make it unclear to them what is real and what isn’t. Doesn’t that technique undermine their understanding of the “reality” of the situation.—RA

It’s a good question. It’s somewhat confusing. Here are my goals.

- I want them to know the trick is a trick.

- I want them to ultimately understand that the context the trick is in is a fiction. But I’d like them to be open to getting immersed in the context and letting it feel real. And, ideally, the trick will be so strong they’ll have no easy answer other than the fantastical one I’ve given them.

- I want there to be elements of the experience that they will not know for sure if they’re part of the reality or the fiction.

That last point is where the techniques I’ve mentioned under the term “smearing” come in.

The next next book (i.e. the one after this coming next book) is likely going to be about this subject.

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I’ve loved your posts on DFB. [Note: That’s the Digital Force Bag app] I was wondering if you switched to using ReaList and if you had any thoughts on that. If you’re not aware, it’s similar to DFB but has the advantage of the list being on the spectator’s phone. —SU

I haven’t purchased this yet, but I intend to.

I think I’ll still use DFB for the most part. For my purposes, ReaList would probably be a step backwards for a few reasons.

First—to be clear—the list isn’t exactly on the spectator’s phone. It’s on a website that the spectator visits on their phone. That’s quite different. Everyone knows websites can be changed and updated in real time.

The goal with most apps is to make the audience think technology is not involved. In my opinion, having them tap on the Notes app on your phone feels slightly more innocent than directing them to an unfamiliar website on their phone. Reasonable minds could disagree. So let’s call the Innocence Factor a draw

Here are the clear benefits of DFB for my purposes:

• When performing magic in social situations I usually want to do things that feel personal and casual. For me, pulling up a list of local restaurants I want to try, or people I want to invite to a party, or gift ideas, or errands I need to run, or activities I want to do, or things I’m studying, or whatever, fits that personal/casual style better than, “Here’s a website with trending searches.” (Of course, if I performed professionally, then “personal and casual” would probably not be what I was going for.)

• I don’t have to explain what a Notes app is or why we’re using it.

• I can get in and out of DFB in less than 10 seconds, if I want. Which—depending on the routine—means the list itself can feel quite incidental to the effect (and in most of the “big” effects I do that use DFB, the focus is not on the list at all). With ReaList you need to get the spectator to go to a specific site and you need to explain the purpose of the site. This takes a bit more time and focus. So it’s going to be much harder to make the trick about something other than that list.

Those are the benefits for me of DFB.

On the other hand, I think ReaList is definitely a better way to do the worst possible tricks that people do with DFB, like a prediction of a celebrity. (And from the couple of times I’ve been on the DFB Facebook group it seems like that’s what the vast majority of DFB users want to do.) I don’t really have any desire to do that trick, but if I did, I would definitely use ReaList over DFB.

If we were smart, we wouldn’t even see these as competing apps. Does the audience see a list in a personal note as the same thing as a list of trending topics on a website? No. So it’s going to come down to what you’re forcing and why and then choosing the appropriate app. If I’m forcing a food, I’d rather choose something randomly from my “grocery list” than a list of the “top trending foods” or whatever. If I’m forcing a celebrity I’d rather force one from a list of trending actors than force one from a list of actors I keep in my personal notes app like a fucking psychopath.

Transitioning Part III

So, maybe every Friday you perform a card trick for some friends before your weekly poker game, or maybe you regularly show some co-workers a trick during lunch in the break room, or maybe you just perform a trick every now and then for your wife. Whatever your typical pattern is, you’ve decided you want to disrupt it in some way in order to transition into some different performance modalities. Here are some ways you might want to go about it that have worked for people I know. You probably won’t use them in isolation. These are elements that can be combined. I use these techniques as well, not for the purposes of transitioning into a new style of performance, but because I think it’s important for the amateur performer to mix things up with his usual audiences from time to time. (More on that in a future post.)

The Hard Reset

Just take a break from performing for people. This is the most blatant type of pattern interrupt because it is literally just an interruption. If they’re used to seeing you perform something once a week and you take a couple months off, then you’ll feel more freedom to come back with something different because rather than an abrupt change in performing styles, you get to establish a style from nothing as you reintroduce magic into your encounters.

Taking some time off has the additional benefit—as Erdnase tells us—that the spectator will regenerate their “magic hymen” and you get to pop their “astonishment cherry” all over again and fill them with your “wonder ejaculate.” Erdnase really had a way with metaphors.

Foreshadowing

You can ease people into a change in styles by leaving some evidence of an impeding shift in a place where they will see it.

Here’s the sort of thing I’ll do:

You and I are co-workers. Every week I show you a new card trick I’ve been working on. This is really straightforward card magic. Right out of Scarne on Card Tricks.

One day you stop by my cubicle and see a book called: Psychic Energy Manipulation. “What’s this?” you ask.

“Oh… nothing. It’s just…. I don’t know. I’m looking into it. I’ll let you know if it leads to anything.”

When a week passes and I come up to you and say, “Hey remember that book I was reading? Can we try something?” I can now transition into something very different from card tricks, but it doesn’t feel so abrupt because I introduced the potential change long before the actual performance.

The Declaration

At some point just announce that you’re going to be doing something different with your magic.

For example, if you’ve taken a break from performing, someone will say, “You haven’t shown us any tricks recently?”

“Oh, yeah. Well… I’m sort of re-learning a different style of magic. I’m not really concentrating on the sleight-of-hand stuff anymore. I’m learning some more esoteric stuff.”

Now you’ve perfectly set the stage for transitioning into a new style of performance in a way that won’t feel odd or out of the blue. In fact, they’ll be anticipating it.

An Example

Getting people open to a more immersive style of magic is just a matter of getting them accustomed to the idea that you’re going to be showing them magic in a less direct fashion. The relationship isn’t always going to be, “I’m the magician and I’m going to show you—the spectator—a magic trick.” They need to understand there’s going to be more to the “game” of the interaction.

Here’s a fun way that I would transition away from a traditional style with a context that is stupid yet gently immersive.

This would work well for me because I like saying dumb things seriously.

Let’s say I’m hanging out with some friends. They ask if I have any new tricks I’m working on.

“Magic tricks? No. That’s the old me. I’m not into that stuff any more. It’s just childish nonsense. It doesn’t help anyone. And it’s certainly not a viable business opportunity.”

I get up and walk over to the end table and remove something from the drawer. “I’ve got a new passion now. I guess you could say it’s still ‘magic’ related. But this is real magic. The magic of…,” I open my hand revealing a small vial, “essential oils.”

My attitude is so completely humorless that I must be joking.

“Essential oils have been used for thousands of years to promote health and cure diseases and to help people in 100s of ways. I’m really just looking for some motivated people who want to join my team and make some money working from home in their spare time.

“Here, smell this. It’s bergamot and citrus. This is known to help with memory and focus. Let me show you how well it works. I just need something for you to focus on… hmmm…. I don’t really know… oh, a deck of cards. Perfect.”

And from there I’d go into a card trick but in the context of a demonstration of the memory benefits of this essential oil.

Obviously it would be clear what’s happening very early on (unless you’re the sort of person that would genuinely try and get your friends engulfed in a multi-level-marketing essential oil business) and they would get the “joke” of it. But that’s okay. What you want them to get used to is the idea of a trick being presented as something else. That the trick is going to exist within a broader fiction. And that you’re asking them to play along with it but you’re not asking them to believe it. They need to get that concept first before you move on. And doing your first few presentations of this style in a humorous manner will help make that point.

If you were a member of a remote tribe that had never interacted with the outside world for hundreds of years, I couldn’t sit you down at a movie theater and expect you to enjoy a film. You’d be wondering what was going on. Are those people on a stage? Are they gods? Is there really a battle going on or some monster coming towards us? Only after you understood that these were images projected on a screen and the people were acting out a story, could you learn to relax and allow yourself to get caught up in the experience.

It’s the same with this style of magic. You want them to fully understand the fictional element of the interaction. Once they do, you can approach it with a much more serious attitude and can create immersive presentations that aren’t just humorous. They can be scary, romantic, nostalgic, life-affirming, etc.