melange (2)

A mix of Time Travelers, Time Capsules, and BOF Bonuses Gregg teaches animation and invents and writes about magic and illustrates about magic. He also paints and plays keyboards.

April 2012 Greetings, from the future. I’ve always been interested in time travel, and now I ARE ONE! Years ago I did a painting I thought would make me rich, of a clock built as a spiral, trying to show time as a cyclical, not linear, or maybe better said, as a combination of the 2 ideas. Lately, especially after reading Stephan Hawking’s recent stuff, when I realized he was insane, I stopped believing in the possibility of time travel … and one day I awoke and … it was the future! WOW! So I named the newsletter TIME TRAVELER, but there is also a card trick I came up with which I’ll run first … then … back to rehashing my old newsletters. So ……..

Time Traveler The Card Trick By Gregg Webb For quite a while this was the card trick I would always do on laymen. You get familiar with a pet trick. After a long time, it suddenly hit me that I could improve the trick. My commentaries are not so much about the people as they are about DETAILS OF HOW TO IMPROVE A TRICK BIT-BY-BIT UNTIL THEY APPROACH MAGIC. YAY! And then, a new handling presented itself on the ending “SHOW” and I realized I never wrote this trick up but now could include the new work.

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Effect: Similar but shorter than Bro. Hamman’s trick “card on the table” where a selection disappears amongst “4” Aces then reappears as the card on the table from the start. In mine it is not the 4 Aces but 2 Jokers that make it go, but the structure is different – in mine the selection is lost in the deck, and before the Jokers are taken out … but a card (an unknown card) was placed on the table at start. It ends up “being” the selection! (Between 2 Jokers used to scoop it up) Mine was inspired by Trevor Lewis move but that changed to the Gregg Webb Move. Required: A deck and 2 Matching Jokers. Setup: 2 matching jokers on top. The trick: False cuts or shuffles if desired. Then – take top card and put on table and say “Please note that I won’t go near this card until the end of the trick.” (or “experiment”). Also note that you don’t show this card. It is unknown! It is the mystery. There is another matching Joker on top. Have a card selected from the middle of deck. After they show it around, for the replacement, do a swivel cut (or swing cut) taking top half of deck into left hand. With your right hand (holding bottom half of deck) gesture that they replace card on left hand group. After they do, drop right hand’s group – the original bottom half … on top but keep a break. After a pause, double-undercut to the break. Selection will be on top, above the other Joker from the 1 on table. (There are many controls possible. This is fine. For laymen. Say, “I can’t find your card …it is lost … but I can get a Joker to appear on top. By magic”. Tap the top of the deck and then do a double turnover to show the Joker (a double, backed by their selection). Turn the double and deal the top card (the selection) to the table well away from the mystery card (a Joker) placed down at the start of the trick. Saying, “I also need the other Joker” you tap the deck and turn up the same Joker they just saw but it seems like another joker and you turn it down and put it face down on the face down selection they think is the other Joker. Say “The reason I need the two Jokers is so I can scoop up the card from the table without touching it! Here, after scooping up the mystery card, is where I used to do the Trevor Lewis move but now do the Gregg Webb Move! I’ll go into exquisite detail. The 2 card pile you just made is a joker on top of the Selection! The Mystery Card is actually the other joker. The audience thinks the 2 card pile is 2 jokers. They saw 1 joker twice.

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Gregg Webb Move: Pick up the top card of the pile of 2 with right hand (It is a joker) Pick up the other card of the pile of 2 with the left hand. Use these to scoop up the mystery card (it’ll end up between them) Note: Follow these details! The right hand scoops under the mystery card and the left hand’s card goes above the mystery card … sandwiching it. Here comes “the Move”. Note that mine derives from Bro. Hamman’s but is completely different. I like mine better … but not just because it’s mine. I tested the three methods … including the Bro. Hamman ending to “Card On Table!” Your right hand draws the Bottom card out to your right and flips it sideways to your left into a face up condition. Drop this on top of the packet. (A Joker shows) Next your left hand shows the lower card the same way. But draw card out to your left, then turn it face up and put it under all. Another Joker shows.

Next you have someone look at the spread deck! This is the new idea! Yes, indeed-y-deed! Short of having a card signed, spreading the deck so they can see there is no duplicate … or whatever it is “they” think. People used to sometimes say “Oh, I see, it is the same as my card”. [When really it was their card] But spreading the deck first so they see their card is not there helps them

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realize the card to be revealed in the sandwich IS in fact their card …not just “the same as” their card. Without a signature! Of course, if you want to have it signed, by all means have them sign it. And finally, have spectator pull the face down card … the mystery card supposedly, from between the 2 Jokers. The patter is something like “you didn’t see me go, but I traveled back in time – switched the card – and came back to the then “NOW” and finished the trick!” - what fun-

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Nate Leipzig – What a Guy! Nate Leipzig did a trick with 5 spectators who all got a 5 card hand of draw poker. Each upjogged 1 and concentrated. Then they pushed the cards flush and the hands were collected. I'm not sure if there was a false shuffle (whether you do or don't false shuffle makes 2 different effects - since the trick uses second-dealing, if you don't false shuffle the trick seems to be about dealing. If you do false shuffle, the trick may seem to be about trick shuffles and help hide the use of seconds.) His way used a key number for each hand. You'd deal regular up to your number per 'round' and then begin holding back to get the card to your (5th) hand. You'd then show you dealt yourself all the selections. Marlo had a version in Marlo In Spades. I forget the details. I came up with a version with a punch deal (bump, blister) for feeling the card for the second deal and there was a special feature that Meir Yedid told me was original. What I did was have the 'punched' bump card be the highest card in each hand (via a setup) so that each spectator was to look at their hand and remember and concentrate on the highest card in the hand. Pretty clever (ahem). Then they could mix their hand - didn't matter. The punch card in each 'round' of dealing would be held back for me. *** Today's offering retains that gaff being the highest card in the hand, each hand, of 5 hands, but with a different gaff. Here I went to a short card being the highest card in each of 5 hands. My thinking is this, lately, I'm giving up on my trick deals for other methods. Quite simply, I'm getting away from the 'real work' and trying more for magic than for what a gambler would do. Here's how it would work, then the details. After each person has memorized the highest card in their hand, each hand would be shuffled and upon getting it back, each hand would be cut at the short card. This puts the short card at the top of packet. Next you need to run it to the bottom. The first card peeled in an overhand shuffle must be a single...the rest are less important. Now the Short card arrives at the bottom of the hand and hand is dropped on the deck. One interesting detail is that if when you get the hand after the spectator's shuffle, the short force card (highest in the hand) may be at the top or bottom of hand and if this is the case, harder to detect and also hard to find and cut to. When this happens, give the packet a casual cut in the middle and begin again to feel for the short card to cut to - then run it to bottom. Do the same with each packet, and when done with all 5 hands, you will have stacked the selections to arrive at the 5th hand when dealing out poker.

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I've substituted casual cut(s) and toying with the cards (the run) which should look almost absent minded while you patter about how each person merely thought of a card from their hand. Blah blah blah. *** Ain’t time travel wonderful?! - See you in time next time -

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May 2012 Hey! I was sitting in a pizzeria in Queens, NY. A guy with a FDNY shirt (fire fighters) was in a corner booth (by his self) talking on a cell phone loud about how the world would end May 21, at 6:00! See, he even had the time…6:00 at the International Date Line…then it (the end) would follow around the world as the world turns. And he kept yelling (I think he was talking to an accountant or relative in that field) that this was all in the bible! I kept wanting to tell him it wasn’t in the bible…or perhaps, offer to bet him that the world wouldn’t end…but then my pizza was ready and I could leave and was thus saved!

Coins, Coins, Coins 2 Copper and 1 Silver (or Copper Silver Brass) with no gaffs!! By Greggo Webbo Gary Kurtz has a great move in his book called Take Two which is a switch of 2 coins for 2 other coins, based on a Marlo vanish with 1 coin. First I'll teach the Marlo, then skim over the Kurtz switch and go into my variation of the Kurtz which will be a 1 for 2 switch, not much originality there I guess, but then I'll teach my use for it which you'll like. Holding a coin between right thumb and 1st finger, insert this into the left thumbhole of a loose left fist. It goes all the way into a left Classic Palm. Then you can pretend to hand the coin to someone but when they open their hand to accept, you can open your hand and by wiggling the fingers, 'prove' the coin has gone. (Me, I like dodges...I just had the thought that I might use this if I added a dupe coin in right Classic Palm from the start, so just when they notice the 'vanish' by the left hand, that you can produce a coin from

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their left elbow with your right hand (to get their attention off the left hand) and then to take this visible coin with the left fingertips to take the curse off the left claw. That also introduced the idea of a dodge I'll use in the routine I'll suggest for my Take 2 for 1 variant (or is it Take 1 for 2??). The history lesson is that the Kurtz move involved having 2 coins in left fingerpalm. Let's say those are coppers. Now, in view are 2 silver coins squared at the tips of the right first finger and thumb and these are inserted in the left thumbhole of loose left fist and all the way into left Classic palm. Now, as you open your left hand over a table, or over someone's open hand, perhaps after blowing on the left fist for magic or luck, the coppers drop out. This is such an elegant move, I love it. All that I did was change the two squared silvers into just 1 silver because it fits the 2 Copper 1 Silver theme, or you could have a copper and a Chinese coin in left fingerpalm and when the silver is inserted it changes into a Copper and a Brass! All I added next for a dodge end is to have a dupe silver in right classic palm from the start. After the 2 coppers or 1 copper and 1 brass fall from the left hand, you can produce the silver with your right hand. A more complex routine is to have dupes of everything. Let's use the 2 copper, 1 silver format for explanation purposes. Hidden in left fingerpalm is one set of 2 coppers. The other set of 2 coppers is distributed with one at the left fingertips, in view, and 1 at the right fingertips, in view. A dupe silver is hidden in right classic palm. A separate silver is on the table in view or on a spectator's palm. The routine here would be to show the coppers that are in view, and this pose helps hide the face that both hands are dirty. Now pass the left's copper to the right hand so now the right hand has 2 coppers at the fingertips. Now go to a right side pocket and ditch the 2 coppers. When your right hand comes out of pocket, silver still hidden in its palm, go straight to the visible silver on table or on spectator's hand, and pick it up. This silver goes into the loose left fist and into left classic palm. After a magic gesture or word, 2 coppers drop out of left hand and onto table or their hand. To 'dodge' and pull attention away from the left hand, produce the silver from right classic palm... perhaps from a spectator's elbow. Put it at left fingertips to give the dirty left hand something to do. Eventually take all visible coins to pockets, both hands working at once, ditch the dupe at the same time. -- have funzies --

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One hears that the danger of Time Travel is that if anything should change or be changed that that will alter the future. I say … “Bring it off.” Seriously … I didn’t make it clear that during the performance to come that the person with the dog whistle is an assistant or stooge hidden in the wings (or the cloak room) is the one who blows the dog whistle, not you the magician. I didn’t mean that of course but in my writing I didn’t make it clear enough. Now I can!

Dog Whistle and Dog of Psychic Dog I If you have a dog, great! If not, get one, and preferably a Jack Russel Terrier. This trick takes some training - the good news is, being magicians, we are pretty smart. All animals respond to food rewards or ’treats'. What you have to do is train your dog to bark when he hears the whistle. Hint: Tease the dog by waving the treat around but not giving it until the dog barks. Then give the treat and blow the whistle and say GOOD DOG! After a while, change the procedure until the whistle is blown first, and then wave the treat around. What you are really doing is training the dog to bark to get the treat. In performance we will be using ESP symbols or playing cards. Either using a stack, rosary stack, or whatever method, even a force, the person with the whistle must know what card it is. Giant cards would help. When the selected (?) card is shown, and the whistle is blown...the dog barks. Whistle is blown secretly by assistant!! What is required to get this trick to work is that the person who selected must be convinced the card is really lost. One pro way would be a force deck and a regular deck that is missing the card forced. A very easy deck switch is done while the spectator shows the selected one to the mob. Just turn away, and the old poacher's pocket (Topit to you magicians) does the trick. The selection is replaced in the new deck which is regular and with the replacement is now perfect and the helper shuffles. No for everybody – especially not those with no dog or desire to get one … but a fun thing to think about. Note: Stooge in wings blows the whistle!

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PS. I am writing a short story about a ghost dog that comes when the dog whistle is blown … it’s a spooky story! It may get animated. *** One thing I try to do is put in less cards unless good.

Sometimes I come up with an idea for a gimmick and actually bother to make it up and test it. This went over well with magicians and magiciennes. I never tested it on laymen. I should. Maybe it isn't just a magician fooler. What this is, is an attempt to make a rubber band like a rope gimmick. The magnetic kind. Imagine really linking two big fat rubber bands. True. At Staples Office Supplies, and I'm sure elsewhere, you can find thin rubberized magnets in sheet form to stick to the back of a business card so someone can stick it on their refrigerator. Peel and stick. This stuff is thin enough to cut easily with a scissors and the adhesive is sticky enough to stick onto a wide rubber band.

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Cut two small squares of the rubberized magnet less than the width of your big rubber band. Cut the band, and affix the magnets after peeling. You'll also need a regular ungimmicked band and I've found that this one is best being the same color and not a different color. So, now we're ready. Like Linking Ropes. You can do the Vernon move of supposedly rotating the gimmick band in your hands but it is really mime and an illusion and the gimmick stays hidden behind the fingers. Also, with a switch the same one can be shown clean, supposedly exchanged for the other, but really the same one is shown again. Casual and bold, this will fool.

Pot Holder for Close Up Mat Especially H.P.C!

Those that know me know I like HPC. One trouble is that you need a table and also a soft surface...a mat or I've folded a scarf to get some thickness or even a jacket, mouse pad. The reason is that after you slap down — there are 2 times you slap down, and then you want to pick up the coins again without fumbling. You need to get a rhythm going and a fumble destroys that. And so today I offer the idea of something found in any home you may visit. Now you don't have to work on the rug (which isn't bad) and the idea is the lowly pot holder for lifting something hot off the stove. See my drawing; should tell the whole story. The size is definitely big enough for the left hand to do its slapdown and pickup (and now those coins are protruding from heel of fist...and then slap down and do the move with the right hand with the assist from the left hand letting go and moving aside. Then pick up the coins on the pot holder which are added to the ones concealed in the right hand...and you are on your way.

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A New L’Homme Masque Load Variation I've been having fun with this. I think you'll like the feel. Let’s say we have just 2 coins a silver and a Chinese, or whatever you have that are different colors. Just the 2 coins is the beauty of this one. Have 1 (let’s say silver) on the table or spectator's open hand. Put the other (let’s say Chinese) into the left hand, supposedly, but really only pretend to do that and really keep it right fingerpalm. I've been using the Old English Drop vanish which keeps the coin in right fingerpalm. If you like, you can use a vanish that leaves the coin in right CLASSIC palm, but not many have a great classic so I have lately been creating around fingerpalm. Whichever, I'll explain for both, reach for the silver with the right hand. Spectators think the coin is in the left fist (nothing but air really there). We are about to do a Palm Change. You can cover a small move with a bigger move by saying IF I SQUEEZE REAL HARD to cover any 'tells' of your change...you can go classic-to-classic or if you have used fingerpalm, you can pick up the silver and push it into the right hand classic palm in spite of the fingerpalmed Chinese. In any case, drop the Chinese to fingertip rest and then move it to between the right 1st and 2nd fingertips as shown. Now, with the Chinese coin held pinched between the right 1st and 2nd fingers, do your L'Homme Masque Load of the Silver into the left fist. To end reveal the silver by opening the left fist smartly and display the transposed coins in opposing hands.

And there you have it! ***

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Copper-Silver with 2 C/S Coins When you have 2 C/S coins in play it allows you to use some interesting moves are possible. There's the Jules DeBarros move from Coins of Ishtar where you hold two coins (both c/s) fanned between 1st and thumb and you see 1 is copper and 1 silver! Turning the hand over to show the other sides, and they see 1 copper, and 1 silver! I came up with one, with 2 coins overlapping on the hand, 1 copper and 1 silver (both c/s coins) and doing like a one-handed ribbonspread turnover (with coins instead of cards) to show the other sides - guess what they see? 1 copper and 1 silver! Right! And if we add the Addendum Move we are SET with plenty of deceptions. If we do the Addendum Move with both hands at once, just remember to look at the hand with the Copper coin showing ...that'll be our little rule. Effect: A copper coin and a silver coin are shown. They are shown on both sides, over and over, in a myriad of ways (!). Then one is placed on the palm of each hand..., and then they just change places and are shown both sides each, (in a myriad of ways). (!) I like this approach to magic...very clean looking magic with a lot of subtlety and not having to switchout at end...but I'll give a method even so (for those fastidious souls; plus I like the switchout (from my dice routine). Method with details: You need two Copper/Silver gaffs. If you want to do the switchout, you need a real copper and silver too. You also need a drawstring bag. To begin have a gaff on each hand, just on your side of the line where the fingers join the palm. One shows silver and one shows copper. Now you'll do the Addendum Move with both hands at once, and as you do, look at the hand with the copper side showing. Also, if at all possible, have 'tails' showing on the silver side of gaffs. Anyway, do the Addendum Move, as taught here many times before. Close hands, turn fists palm down, get thumbs in there and pin gaffs to insides of fingers then straighten fists and wrists and straighten fingers and push gaffs foreward as you set down on table. (Note: In certain cases with this move you don't have to put the gaff or gaffs on table, but can just pause for the viewers with the coins pushed foreward protruding enough to see. In this case you could do that then place one on the other fanned out, and do the Jules DeBarros move (the paddle move thing). End by doing my 2-coin ribbonspread turnover style 'show'. If you are casual and look at the hand with the supposed copper, you will have convinced all that you have 1 of each kind without a switch needed.

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Announce that the coins will change places and here we do an Addendum Move to prove while they are looking, that there is 1 silver and 1 copper. Pick them up so that this time the coins are on the fingers not the palm. This time when you close your fist the coins turn over. Then to make it seem mysterious, turn each fist palm down and then palm up again then open each hand one at a time and here you could open each finger in order starting with the pinkie...when done smoothly this adds class. Now end with another Addendum Move with both coins at once...to kill any possible thought that the coins might be c/S coins not that laymen would call them that. Repeat the DeBarros move and the Webb ribbonspread turnover with coins and then...if you must... Webb's Switchout. In your right pocket is the open drawstring bag with the regulation coins inside. Pretend to put the gaffs into your left fist. Really you fingerpalm them in your right hand. Occasionally jiggle your left hand a tiny bit (keeping that hand alive) and as your right hand goes to the right pocket, you ditch the gaffs outside the bag as quietly as you can but if there is any coin talk, the little jiggles of your left hand is meant to cover and explain that. Come out with the bag which is open and pretend to just dump the supposed left hand coins into it. Actually this is just acting, but as soon as you act that out, do a brisk shake of the bag (as if making sure the coins go all the way in, which jingles the real coins inside, and pull the drawstring if you want and set the bag down off to the side. Don't offer it to anyone to examine...so just act like you are done and go into a card trick or something. Someone may ask to see the coins and if they do, you are safe and clean. While they look just say "An American silver half-dollar and an English copper penny" as if they were only curious as to what those odd coins were...play dumb about even the existence of gaff coins. - chow -

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Return to Poor Man’s Raven “The Ghost of Ramsay” By El Webbo Perchance you remember poor man's raven? I ran that in an older newsletter. It used a palm magnet made from a bottlecap with a magnet and some felt glued on, and a silk, and a shim coin or a shell coin with some shim material glued inside, or a small magnet just as good. You also needed a real coin. The trick, which is now famous since Jeff McBride and David Regal both like it, was to put the real coin on your left hand, then the silk and then on top of all the shell with shim or magnet inside. Well, a wave of the flat right hand with palm magnet inside caused the top coin to poof vanish into thin air, because the coin would jump onto the palm magnet in the right classic palm. Then the right hand would whisk away the silk to reveal that the coin penetrated the silk just like that! So I was wondering - How can one improve on such wonderfulness? And then it hit me! Wow! John Ramsay never did a trick like this! But! Hmmm. I guess his Coins and Cylinder is his most famous thang. (I never really worked on that there ting...yet I can give an homage to John Ramsay just the same...in this raven trick. Wow! First off, let's agree that the shimmed shell coin or small magnet (tiny in fact) glued under the shell be what we use and not a shimmed coin that is not a shell, or a magnetic coin that is not a shell, but solid with the shim hidden inside. This is because we want a hollow space on the under side. This is because we will hide something there. What we are doing is an idea from Ramsay's Coins and Cylinder and in that trick there is a cork (really 2 corks). In our trick we are adding a penny (really 2 pennies) to the trick done with a silverish Half Dollar or Quarter that seems to penetrate a hand in the most amazing way except that now there will be a penny placed on the Quarter (let's say) and when the Quarter disappears, the penny remains (adding a level of mystery...if you picked up the quarter someway, wouldn't the penny go with it? Therefore... since the penny is there well then the magician must have done something else.) You'd pick up the penny and whisk away the silk and there is the missing Quarter under the silk. The Props: As stated, the palm magnet is best made so you can palm the rough mouth of a bottlecap, and there is a magnet and felt glued to the bottom. The shell quarter with small magnet or shim glued inside (think 5-minute Epoxy) can have a magnetic penny that attaches to the upper side of the gaff quarter...but even more practical and easy is just a regular penny glued with Epoxy to the quarter, a little off- center. (Just before doing the trick, you can mime moving the penny around, adjusting it etc. Just as good.)

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But...under this gaff is a single dupe regular penny. Then (all this on your flat left hand) the silk, and under the silk on the left hand is the regular dupe quarter - ungaffed. Perform: With palm magnet in place, use your right fingers to supposedly move the penny around on top of the quarter. This is justy mime. Next, pass your right hand over the gaff and it jumps on and clings to, the palm magnet. It looks like the quarter disappears, but really what they see is the penny that was under the entire gaff. This is like the cork in the Ramsay trick. Use your right first finger and thumb to pinch the penny and pick it up. Use the right middle and ring fingers to clip a corner of the hank and whisk it away. There on the left palm is the real quarter with, hopefully, a date that matches the one on the gaff - and the dates on the pennies should match as well...as well as the amount of shine. I hope you like this variation on Poor Man's Raven. On time travel: “Going forward in time isn’t hard … but it is slow! Going back in time is the challenge. Time capsules require consideration. This newsletter is more like a time capsule. Maybe my next newsletter will be called “Time Capsule.” Wow! Gregg Webb 2012 - see you in the future -

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June 2012 To me … one of the most interesting things about time is that before the big bang, there was no time!! Think about that. Then, think about it again. What would it be like with no time … or anything else either? My question is … has time stayed constant from the beginning or is it slowing down? Or, is it speeding up? Einstein would say it changes. The rate of expansion of the universe is said to be speeding up! Is that the same as time speeding up? There will be a quiz next month! Back to rehashing old magic. Wait! Wait! Wait! Stop the presses. I just heard that Hermetic Press helmed by Steve Minch will be releasing in June 2011 two new books … essays by Jamie Ian Swiss, who, although ‘knowledgeable’ … when he himself does magic … it is awful, so you think “If he knows so much, why not apply it???” And yet … there are people who know a lot about many things yet can’t apply it. “Those that can’t do, teach!” So I guess he’s a teacher of magic. (Meanwhile, there are many people who are great at something but can’t teach. This is very common.) I favor the situation of someone who CAN DO and CAN ALSO TEACH. *** But I’m willing to believe Steve Minch when he says “He knows his stuff” yet I probably won’t read essays. ***

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Next is something I would read and may get … Barry Richardson’s Curtain Calls. Barry’s brand of mentalism is just swell … So I’m sure Steve Minch is right on his call of this one being very good, too. Steve is modest and I’m sure it is even better than that. *** And so on into the vaults of the Time Capsule that is my collection of old newsletters in search of the rare worthwhile item. Wait … there’s one … and it’s not cards.! Yay! Cards are cool but there is so much written about them already … plus as we speak new card ideas are coming out by the “card tricks crowd.” Not to say I don’t like cards, and I admit trying to come up with the next new thing with them … from time to time … but I also like to invent non-card items … and at least some of the card specialists .. read only do cards … don’t (or can’t … even if “can’t” is only because there is no time since all their time is taken up with cards.) *** This next move could also be done with that Renee Levand move I explained lately. Check it in!

More Coins – Addendum Move with a Shell Those that know me know about the Addendum Move, which is a false turnover I invented for 'proving' that gaff coins aren't. Good in C/S tricks with C/S coins to show as if the same color on both sides. I'll review this but let me just say that today's article is about using this move with a shell! A little theory on this move. A) You must use this with misdirection. The best way is to have a gaff in one hand and a regular coin in the other hand, and as you work both hands at once, you look at the hand with the regular coin! Furthermore, you do the Addendum Move with the hand with the gaff (the hand you are NOT looking at) and with the other hand and its regular coin...YOU DO A REAL TURNOVER THAT YOU'VE PRACTICED TO LOOK LIKE THE ADDENDUM MOVE! This is like when you study your second deal and then make your real deal look like your second deal. Another aspect to this all is that the eye goes to the silver coin when you have copper and silver in evidence. Take this into consideration when deciding what coin to use where in a routine. Finally, the tail side is less suspicious (especially if you are looking at your other hand,) than seeing two heads. Consider this. When choosing a shell, I would say in all cases a shell that shows tails is more useful than a head that is what does show on your shell, but they seem to make them more often with heads, oh well.

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Let's review the move and show it with a shell on your left palm, not on your fingers. The right hand has a regular coin in the same position. Here is where you look at your right hand which will do a real turnover. As I said before, if you can find a shell that shows a tail it is a tiny bit more deceptive than them seeing 2 heads, or if it were a Copper English Penny shell showing tails...this would be the best of all worlds. But, looking at the other coin does wonders. You'd be pattering about something else anyway, not about heads or tails or the color of the coins. The fake turnover: Close both fists palm up, but loosely. You don't have to squeeze. Now as you turn both fists palm down, the coin and shell drop to the pads of the fingers in what Roth calls Fingertip Rest. Now, since the fist isn't tight, you can now get your thumbs in their respective hands and the thumbs press the shell and coin against their fingers that they rest on. Now straighten the left wrist and open the hand out almost flat and deposit the shell on the mat or table. Simultaneously the right thumb instead of pinning its coin to the fingers, instead contacts the edge of coin which keeps the coin from doing a half-turn as the hand and wrist straighten. As the right deposits its coin on the table, you'll see it has only done a half-turn total and therefore is showing the other side from when we started. Let's say you are going to make a vanish or whatever, and step the shell over the coin. As you go to pick up the top coin, which is really the shell, in fact the shell slips over the coin as you pretend to lift it and take it away. This is standard, and my point is just that by virtue of the Addendum Move and casualness and bluff acting you have implied very strongly (when you get the knack and the casualness... it will be proof that you don't have a shell therefore that can't be the method. (Many kids have visited magic shops and understand shells as in Scotch and Soda or the like...what they haven't seen is someone do - in essence, a paddle move with a shell. Neither have magicians. So work on it. Have fun. *** Coins again. A Webb original idea from long ago that I forgot to write up (I think) but David Roth liked it! It is merely a variation on a standard Roth Shuttle Pass … but one never knows where some odd thing might fit … does one?

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Note: Right hand has a 3rd coin in right fingertips rest position. The Move: It is a regular “shuttle pass” and the coin between left 1st finger and thumb just goes along for the ride. After the pass, the coin between the left first finger and thumb is still in view (of course) and the one supposedly “passed” to the right hand is in left fingerpalm.

The right hand holds in view the coin it had in “fingertips rest” as if it were the coin “passed” to it. Context: Let’s say the left hand shows two coins on flat left hand. Let’s also say that you only want to do a shuttle-pass with 1 of them instead of doing a utility move (Bobo) which allows the seeming dump of all into right hand. So … follow along … you take 1 coin, (the one not near left fingerplam position), into the left thumb and first finger position as already explained. Now you can do the new shuttle, and then turn left hand palm up but necktied slightly to keep fingerpalmed coin hidden. Now put the single from right hand into left palm …

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then take the visible coin from left 1st finger and thumb and drop it into left cupped hand. When you close the left hand, the fingerpalmed coin joins the others and now there are 3 coins in the left hand. ***

A Newish Ending to Coins Across By Gregg Webb I made a special trip into NYC to see the David (David Roth) to ask him if this was new. He said it is newish! What does that mean? So … I am going ahead with my description of this … and with two methods. Effect: As you near the end of a “coins across”… and let’s assume we’re using 4 coins and a Chinese coin! Let’s say the coins are travelling from the left hand to the right! OK. And let’s say the audience thinks 3 (silver) coins have magically traveled to the right hand to join the magic odd coin – the Chinese. But, in reality we are 1 ahead and therefore have the 4th coin in right classic palm. So… the viewers see 3 coins plus the odd Chinese coin on the table. The right hand seems empty to them because your palm is so good! They think the 4h coin is in the left fist… yet to go. Actually the left fist is empty. Fine! Newish magic!: Ok. Here goes! Pick up the Chinese coin with the (palming) right hand [without flashing the coin you are palming] and do a Palm Change (palm to palm change) and drop the silver coin to the mat. Or table. They just saw the odd magic Chinese coin “change into” the 4th coin. To give this all some closure… we can now do a L’Homme masque load into the Left Fist of the Chinese Coin and then dramatically reveal it by opening the left hand and dropping the Chinese coin to the table. 2nd M.O.: Modus Operandi 2 – Here we use an English Penny for the odd coin, not a Chinese! The odd coin itself changes to silver by turning it over. Now there are 4 silvers!

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The left hand could have another C/S gaff coin… so you could even flash silver right up till the end and then show copper there at the end. *** P.S. For this 2nd M.O., think of using all the known methods for doing fake turnovers and paddle-moves and such that you can casually do to imply that they are seeing both sides of coins. Note: tails showing on both copper and silver sides of both gaffs is a plus if you can. For some reason… seeing 2 tail sides… especially on the copper coin doesn’t seem odd at all You realize that no one knows what this kind of coin looks like anyway. All that helps is if they just don’t notice 2 heads. That would jump out. And you realize that you don’t say much, except “copper coin” or “silver coin” and you never look at your hands or the gaff while you do the move anyway. Supposedly Michael Rubenstein is working on compiling fake turnovers + paddle-type moves with C/S gaffs. So if you know how to contact him on-line, do so. I met him once… seems very nice. I run every new idea of mine past David Roth who is interested in history of moves and really keeps up. He seems to respect that I strive for my own ways of doing things rather than just doing his way on everything. His way is better for him! I still wonder what he meant by “it is newish” when I asked about this effect. -Fast Foreward-

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July 2012 Thank Odin (or somebody?) I made it back in time! Hey … I saw an item in Tannen’s circa 1971 and years later I came up with a way to do it with sleight-of-hand! The original turned a balloon into a plastic half bottle which if kept “dead on” to the viewers … was a good trick! The fake bottle was handled like a flip stick and it had a pin sticking out of it which would break the balloon and the bottle would take its place! Well … I just decided, why not just substitute a real beer bottle (or could be a Norm Nielson rubber bottle) and have a push-pin in the other hand. (?)

Balloon to Bottle My favorite thing is Standup Manipulation. I originally only wanted a closeup Ace trick because after my card manipulation act people would often say “I wouldn’t want to play cards with you” and they meant it as a compliment. They also always thought they were being terribly original, with that line. Almost as bad as "Make my wife disappear". And so, I learned Twisting the Aces but then I got interested in Ace Tricks and finally Closeup Magic. Now I'm actually cutting back on closeup and really interested again in standup manipulation. I keep forgetting to work on mentalism so must not really care about it. I will be running 1 mental thingee soon. Here we are. I'm thinking about an old dealer item that was half- a bottle, plastic, and there was a sharp pin coming out of it. It was only the front half and this was to keep it thin. It was decorated to look like a real liquor bottle, Cognac or such. You held it by the

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top or can we say the 'cap' and it was tucked back behind the arm as in a Flip Stick vanish. You held a balloon between the hands, mainly controlled by the left. The balloon was lofted a few inches into the air. As it fell back down, the bottle was levered out as in producing a Flip Stick and the pin caused the balloon to break and it looked like the balloon changed into a bottle! A good trick. The only drawback was that the bottle was only half-a-bottle and didn't look too great at that. So I set to thinking. Pretty soon I realized that it was a good trick (the timing has to be learned...there is a knack to it, but I also realized that it could be done with a real bottle - a beer bottle. Webb variation Teach In: Get an empty beer bottle. I'll wait. Only have the one so you can remember these instructions. Let's imagine you are going to hide the bottle behind your right forearm - a la a Flip Stick. (Turn slightly stage left) Insert your right middle finger into the neck-hole of bottle. When your middle finger and ring finger and pinkie are curled, leaving the right thumb and 1st finger free, the bottle is hidden behind right forearm. When the fingers are straightened out, and you turn to the front or even slightly stage right, the bottle appears between the left hand, which now holds the foot or bottom of bottle and the neck is seemingly held by the right hand but is really on the right middle finger. Getting the finger out of there in a subtle way is the hardest part of the trick. Details - adding a PushPin and a Balloon: In this version, the left fingers will hold a pushpin. The right 1st finger and thumb will hold the tied nozzle (neck) of the balloon. Standing slightly stage left, the bottle is hidden along right forearm. The right first finger and thumb also hold a balloon by its tied neck. The balloon is in view, projecting above the right hand. The left hand holds a push pin between the left 1st finger and thumb. The hands are maybe 8 inches apart. The production/change: What will happen is this! The left hand will break the balloon with the push pin. Immediately, the right fingers straighten swinging the bottle out from behind the forearm and the left hand catches the base of the bottle with its palm and free fingers. As you face slightly stage right now, the finger is withdrawn out of the bottle to adopt a Ta-Daaah pose. In closing, this is a platform or stage trick. I notice that a lot of closeup guys don't realize this without telling them - they just think it is a mistake or bad trick - whatever! I suppose you could use a smaller bottle but you'd have to use a more secretive PIN than a pushpin.

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For stage or platform work, the pushpin is practical because it is easier to find. For the fastidious, you could paint the push-pin flesh color, (the real work) black if your coat is black. have - fun -

Selection Monte Yipee! I love it when I get a new idea! Just when I think it is safe to come out of the water, boom, a new idea! Wow! I sometimes worry that I'm done. That I'm bled! Finished! Washed up! Spent! But no. Playing with Monte I remembered a Doug Edwards idea to have the Q or whatever 4th and 3 Jokers on top. His method was to do a quadruple Turnover and then turn it down and deal the top card (a joker - first of the 3) to the mat. Then show a Joker next and deal it to one side of the supposed Q, really another Joker, either face up or face down. Then the same with a 3rd card, another Joker. The supposed Q is face down, but is really another Joker. Upon turning the Jokers down, and mixing, they hunt for the Q! They'll get a Joker no matter what! After two more tries, they eventually realize all are Jokers. Right! 3 Jokers! Then you palm the top card of deck - Q, and 'pull' it out of a pocket! I've made some changes, and I have an alternate routine to use in formal shows. You are going to like this, I guarantee it! You need 3 matching Jokers. I save jokers - you will too after this. Have the 3 Jokers on top of deck. Do your favorite falsies. Spread deck for selection don't let top 3 cards be picked. As they memorize the card etc. you are closing spread and while you do, get pinkie separation or break under Jokers. For the return we can use a modified Tilt, or a modified Bluff shift. In the first you tilt all 3 Jokers as a unit, you have to take back card with your right hand and insert it from the back - let them see the depth illusion etcetera. Eventually lose the break and the tilt. For the other way, with your break under 3 jokers, lift the 3 of the cards above the break as one, and keep your right hand and cards angled down in front so they see the back of top joker, and not the edges, because you want them to think you lifted a bigger group than you really did. Also keep the left hand and its majority of deck angled so that the back of top card is seen, not the side. Just draw an imaginary line from a viewer's eye to the top card...this line (which you should always have in mind - maybe I don't stress this enough...I am checking this type of thing all the time in my manipulation act...this should be second-nature to a magician) and it should hit at a 90% angle or perpendicular. In art we have something called perspective and I learned it very young

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so it is automatic to me yet I see my students struggle with it and rarely get it right. It is a similar thing about keeping imaginary lines in mind and in a second-nature way. Anyway, whichever control you use, after replacing the Jokers (as if half the deck) or losing the tilt (secretly during patter and gesticulating but watching those angles)...the selection is under 3 Jokers. Here we go. My differences are that we're going to do Monte with a selected card (not a Queen) and that we'll end up with the selection turning into a third Joker after suitable build-up and then we'll palm it to a pocket from the top of the deck to end. So turn over the top card after a magic gesture such as tapping the deck. Always get as much magic out of your situation as possible. Do not just turn up the top card and say "Here's a Joker". No. Instead (since you already false shuffled or cut at the beginning) to find a Joker on top means you had to magic it there! See? Say "I can't find your card very easily - it's lost in the deck!" "But to warm up I can tap the deck like this and cause a Joker to rise up through the deck." "Watch, again, (tap the deck)". Turn up the next Joker. I forgot to tell you to deal the first Face up to table, and do so with the second. Leave a space between them. Say "Your card is still lost in the deck." Using that patter, spread the deck a little, then as you square, get a break under 2 cards - the 3rd joker then the selection. Saying "Let's see if I can 'get' your card to rise up" tap the deck and do a double turnover - easier that way than a Quad turnover earlier hey what? Ask "Did I get it?" They'll say yes and then turn the double face down and casually put the top (Joker) face down between the face up jokers on the table. (they'll think this is the selection) Now turn the 2 jokers on table face down, one at a time and mix them a bit. Use just your right hand for all that. You want to keep the deck in your left hand and do everything, the turning and the mixing, with the right hand; soon you will do a palming move while they are turning a card up (and they find a joker) The slight mixing helps all this in a certain way. It puts a tiny bit of doubt in their mind as to where the selection is. Say "Point to a card" and when they do, say "Turn it over". It has to be a joker. Do this again. Finally - when you do it the third time... it is only then that they are certain that their card is gone and that there are 3 Jokers on the table. This is the high point of the trick. At first they think they just pointed to the wrong card. Then they try again. Wrong again and here you want them to think the 3rd card must be their card - so when they turn that one up and it is a joker and there are 3 jokers...this is a different ending from what they expected...a Whoah! moment. As for the timing of the palm. By this time you want to have done a top palm in your right hand and taken the deck in an overhand grip with card palmed. This should look like you took the deck from the left hand with your right hand.

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After a pause, you set deck down on table with palming hand then go to your pocket and remove their selection! I'm very happy with this but came up with a different way for a formal show. For a formal show. Some things are more forgiving in a formal show. In card tricks you don't have to deal with someone just grabbing some prop because they feel like it. For that reason I came up with this version with a force deck that is every bit as strong in a formal show, but you may not want to end with this, or have this be your only trick. When I also say Formal Show, I mean not for magicians! Roger that! Your setup is 3 Jokers on top of a 1-way force deck and let's say they're all 2-C cards. At the face put a red-spot card and we're almost set. Take 1 of the 2-C cards and put it in your pocket. What we are playing with is the notion that laymen don't care as much about a signature as we think. The trick is that their selection turns into a joker. The card from pocket is a kicker only...not the central stunt. To perform, do an imperfect faro and just make sure the jokers stay on top and the bottom odd red-spot stays on the bottom. You can do a pretty safe cascade (waterfall) to end. Next have a card selected from anywhere but the bottom or the top 3 cards. They can put it back anywhere except too near the top. Get the most that the return is fair (seemingly fair) and that you don't do any kind of control. You can go right into the Ambitious Jokers to get 2 Jokers on the table. The rest is the same except you don't have to palm to get the card to your pocket. It already (a dupe) is there! Enjoy!

Appearing and Dancing and Vanishing Streamer Platform or Stage Magic by Gregg WEBB This is by far the best stage magic piece for a manipulation type act that I've come up with in a long time! It is based on the Thumb Tip production of a small 6" silk. I connect this trick with Chris Capehart as I always used to see him doing the trick catty-corner from Tannen's when they were on Broadway up from Loew's Theater. He'd do this and the miser's dream and 3-ring Linking Rings. Can't remember what else. Then, years later Jeff McBride gave me long narrow Rainbow streamers which are only 1" wide but pretty long because they are so narrow but still fit the thumb tip!

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That's what I'm using here although you could cut a strip from a bigger silk and get your wife or girlfriend to hem the rough edges. Did I mention a Thumbtip. Pretty big. The Vernet ones are great. Preparation and setup: You'll need a magic table and a hat or bucket or box on it. Next we have to sew or tie black silk thread onto each corner of the end that will go into the thumb tip last. This isn't invisible thread, doesn't have to be for stage. What you don't want to do is use monofilament (clear nylon) because it shines under the lights and looks like a silver thread that is anything but invisible. Repeat - black silk thread. You need one piece that reaches from the center of the stage to one wing, and another length that runs from the center stage to the other wing. Like I said, they attach to the corners of the end of the streamer. The loaded tip is put in a box on your table. The ends in the wings could have tassles or thingees on them to make them easy to find. You could have 2 empty spools of thread to wind the long lengths onto. Finally, you need two assistants. This is the big drawback for some, but this is what makes this work. This must be rehearsed so it becomes artistic! I am attempting to get Jeff McBride himself to try this out for real. To perform: The best way to get set for this would be to be putting your prop or props away from the last trick. Let's say we just did a rope trick and after the bowing and scraping, you put the scissors away in the box on the table. While there, don the loaded thumbtip and try not to tangle the threads running to each wing where your assistants are holding the tassle ends of the long threads. Another big point here is that, you are better off with short sleeves or sleeves rolled or pushed way up because it is the type of thing that audiences will say (if you have sleeves) Oh, it just came out of his sleeve! Big deal! Only when not wearing sleeves will they not say that! Your assistants who will have to practice as hard as a puppeteers to make this artistic, should keep a mild tension on the threads at all times to prevent tangling. You show both hands to be empty in the time honored way for thumb tip and silk work. Next, load the thumbtip with its cargo into the left hand. Now the right hand kind of makes mystic passes over and around the left hand. FINALLY: The Assistants and their threads rise up, causing the streamer to rise out of fist as shown. There should be a swaying back and forth to the movement of the 'head' of the streamer to make it seem alive.

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Hoochie Koochie music would be great! When it is all the way out of your hand, it is best to hold the 'tail' with the left fingers, so that as it continues to 'dance' that the lower part is stationary. Another good idea is to sew a lead sinker or a few B-B's into the tail so there is some weight there. This allows you to have the tail resting on your flat palm, yet the upper part can dance. With this feature, the streamer can dance on the floor, dance on your table or on your shoulder. To end you get a hold of the thing and begin poking it into the fist and thumbtip in timehonored fashion and eventually it is gone and you can show your hands empty (!). I'm real glad this idea flew through my mind and that I wrote it down before it ran away. For the lucky few who have 2 assistants and who feature mid-size magic or at least have a set of that, this is more magical than the Dancing Handkerchief in that with bare hands and arms this streamer appears then it Dances and then it disappears with pretty clean moves. Very clean, in fact! Standup manipulation is my favorite branch and this piece would fit right in. Alternate method: For those with only 1 assistant, I came up with an alternate method. In one wing is a reel strapped to a cinder block or some kind of weight (a box that you carry props in may do) and this is on a table or up on another packing box. This takes the place of one assistant. The thread runs across the stage, the streamer is attached to the middle (and is hidden in thumbtip in a decorative box on your show table and continues on to the other wing where the assistant holds the end. The reel takes up any slack allowed by the assistant so when she moves her hand towards the performer, the reel pulls by the same amount. The dancing undulation (side to side) is perhaps even better with this method. Try both ways if you have two assistants.

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-So you think you can dance?Fast Foreward till next time in time.

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And the world didn’t end on May 21, 2011. And it didn’t end yet in 2012 so …maybe the crackpots can take a break! And so back to magic. Less cards as promised. But some cards. Yay!

An Alternate Handling for KARATE COIN I’ve gotten so that when I play with a prop, that I don't want to do it the way it was designed, or even some new handling 'going around' (like a virus). No! I want to find out what Gregg Webb would do with the prop. You should do the same sorts of things...find out what works for you! And so, what I found while toying with the standard ways - and the early versions I saw had a coin with a smooth hole, not the ragged hole we have today, which I like better (it looks like an object, bullet or finger went through it, was mainly that I missed a lot, not having the skill of Roth or Latta at the real work in those days -or now even - but now I don't care if the version I do is the hardest one around. Or if mine isn’t the hardest around. In short – less worry about what other magicians might think. Many magicians worry way too much about this. I say don’t worry about this at all! Needed are… Karate Quarter Real Quarter Setup: The Karate Quarter is in left hand finger palm. The real quarter is in the right hand, in view as you patter about the low quality of the metal they use in coins nowadays. Pretend to put the coin in your left hand, which is cupped and necktied towards your own self. The real quarter goes into the right finger palm…and you pretend to put it into the left hand (!) Now close your left hand as it holds something (supposedly the real quarter) which it does…but not what they think. And…you have to act like nothing is in your right hand. In other words…look at the tense left fist and don’t look at the relaxed

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right hand…which is relaxed even though finger palming. You want it to seem as if nothing is in the right hand… (Catch on?). OK! Next: The Penetration: Open your left fist a tiny bit. Poke your right first finger into the left pinkie hole of left fist. When you find the opening of the Karate coin, some ‘knack’ required here that you’ll acquire over time – then act out a hard push as if you are poking the finger through a coin. Open the left hand so everyone can see the coin on the right first finger. There are many ways to clean up. The best is still the one shown to me by Geof Latta, who probably learned it from David Roth. In my mind it was Geof who was copying David, not as Jamie Swiss tries to make it sound as if Geof was an original. I was there…and I think Geof was copying David Roth. Anyway, …as the left hand takes the Gaff Karate Quarter off the right first finger, the regular quarter falls from the right finger palm into the cupped left fingers (And Hidden there by a palm up but neck tied Ramsay subtlety while the gaff is displayed by the left thumb and 1st finger. Next . . . a card trick!

Putting in the Fix! …or changes on the Jimmy Grippo Note: A Jimmy Grippo trick van in an earlier Gregg Webb newsletter. It used a doublefaced card. Charles Reynolds and myself both thought the Grippo trick in the earlier issue was good ... but... We wondered if the double/facer could be switched out via a Top Change or such. We had a good session and attacked the problem (how to end supposedly clean) from all the angles we could think of. What became apparent early on was the thought that the double/facer was probably not the best way to go. We were pretty soon back to a wellknown ploy of having a dupe card, not a double faced card, and you can make your own D/F card by putting two cards back-to-back and holding them like a double-lift of some kind and turning that to make a change and you would then unload the card underneath, which is face down, on the face down deck itself by briefly putting the back to back double on the deck and then after a pause taking the face up card which is now clean. The idea of using a dupe goes way back (Erdnase) even though I like to think of it as the Scarne beer commercial trick.

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The exact details vary based on which wav to "change" the back-to- back double. There is the Sleeve Change or Snap Change who's inventor is lost in time. This is perhaps my favorite. Then there is a Swivel Change by Bob Hummer which could look good. Then, the next one brings us to another installment of settingtherecord (straight) wherein I have to tell you that a popular move called Shapeshifter - supposedly by Mark DeSousa is miscredited and was actually "The Pirouette Change" by Oscar Munoz. It is a way of adding snap to the Hummer swivel move. I've seen the move done well a few times and I've even hit it my-self a few times but most times I've seen it has been an OOPS move not hitting in the first try so having to try again to get it after exclaiming OOPS. That leaves me with the sleeve change (snap change) or the Hummer and I hit the snap/sleeve change almost every time but not so the Hummer so you can see where I'm going. (And it gives you a tiny lesson on how to cull a move to use from a group of moves that can accomplish the same thing. Most magicians think they have to pick the one that is "going around" (like a cold) but I don't think that way. If everyone is doing "Shapeshifter" say, I will go out of my way to dig up something similar just on general principal, but I also base my choice on which one I do well rather than devote hours of my future towards learning (or not) a move that doesn't fit me. Some may say 'How can you know if you don't try?". Well, I do try a new move 'going around' a few times. If it feels right to me I may keep it but if not - I throw it back, like a fish too small! Details: Let's assume that the dupe card is the 2-C! Let's assume the other card we'll use is the Q-D! O.K. ! Have 1 of the Dupe 2-C's on the face of deck (face down). On top (face down) of deck is the other 2-C then the Q-D. To perform the trick do a double turnover and show the Q-D. Say "Remember this card", as you turn the double face down and deal the top card (Really the 2-C) onto their hand and have them put their other hand on top of face down card.

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Reach under deck and pull out the other 2-C and put it face up on top of deck as you patter about them noticing the 2-C which will do some magic! Pick up a double card as shown. Held between the R. thumb and 2nd finger ready for Sleeve or Snap Change. Note first finger slightly in a curved position. As you rub the double on your left sleeve, supposedly to build up static electricity, after a few back and forth rubs, the double is allowed to slip off the right 2nd finger and the right 1st finger takes over the job of holding. A loud 'snap' happens, and the card (double) turns over showing the Q-D that was back-to-back under the 2-C. What is nice is that the card turns over (while the right hand is moving) but the right hand doesn't have to turn over, but it does rotate a few degrees so the face of double is correctly ’to' the viewers. This is the key - the right doesn't have to turn over because the grip change causes the double to turn.

To end drop the back-to-backer on the deck and after a piece of patter wherein you get them to look in their hand for the missing you take a single Q-D off the deck so that when they look back the card you hold in the right hand is clean. I hope I pass the audition! Note: I was listening to a Beatles CD at the time. *** On to the Muscle Pass. Daniel Garcia came up with a use for the muscle pass that is a real magical use, not just jock magic like see how high I can make this coin jump. It ran in Genii magazine and also used a flipper coin. If you recall, you placed a flipper coin showing 2 coins (open) on the right palm of a spectator facing you. You held the right wrist of the spectator with

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your left hand and your right hand held the spectator's left wrist. I have to mention that there is a coin palmed in your right palm. The trick itself and a good one at that was to move the viewer's right wrist with your left hand, up and down, and this would cause the flipper coin to flip closed! After some suitable milliseconds, your right palm muscles shot the palmed coin into their left hand with the muscle pass. Yay! Trouble is; I don't have a flipper coin, and never hope to have one. Don't get me started about gaffs. (I use a C/S gaff, and Copper- Silver-Brass and that's it!) Which is a good thing for me. Good in that it forced me to figure out how to do the same trick au naturale.

Feel My Pulse It was probably Bob MacAllister who taught me to turn a negative into part of the trick! Thank Yoda he didn’t say 'turn lemons into lemonade'. Same idea, though. So how can I make not having a flipper coin "Part Of The Trick"? I thought and thought and here is what I found kicking around in the cobwebs of my mind (sung to the tune Windmills of My Mind). I pretend to put a regular coin into my left hand, but Really I keep it in my right hand...then I have a spectator Hold my wrist instead of me holding their wrist when doing the flipper-coin version. Wow! I'm so glad this idea came out and bit me! (Note: You can't really control these things but when they hit, write them down or they go away again and you forget you ever had the thought.) This solves everything, and you patter about her holding your wrist so she can feel your pulse quicken when the coin vanishes. Bruce Elliott suggested (for a different pulse trick) that to speed up your pulse, just imagine that you are having sex with Sofia Loren the way she looked back then although she did age well! I suggest that if you pick a sexy assistant from the audience that this may happen naturally just by her holding your wrist. If not, just remember most people don't know how to take a pulse correctly so use the power of suggestion and bluff acting - twitch your arm, scream "Did you feel it speed up? I sure did! Thank you!" Open your left hand - Yell, "See, its gone!" Now use your muscle pass to launch the coin out of your right classic palm area and into the spectator's palm up left hand. Note: This hand should be OPEN and palm up when you hold HER wrist. There you have it. I'm pretty happy with this variation and the elimination of the Flipper Coin. - fin -

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

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Happy Thanksgiving! First I'm going to review a trick I already ran because of some recent developments. Then I'll run an original new trick using the same prop. I tested out the simplest version of silk and coin with palm magnet (a penetration) on laymen for years and it always went well for walk-around and mingle. But, recently I showed a group of magicians including some of the heaviest hitters in coindom, and even the (the) highest ranking guy in coindom...and I got the best compliment I think possible. "It looks like magic." "It looks like magic." "It looks like magic." What this is is my answer to Raven. I simply hate pulls and hookups. I decided I needed to just classic palm a magnet - maybe attach it to a coin for better palming. This evolved into a bottle cap as the easiest thing to classic palm if you palm the rough mouth of the cap. Felt over the magnet to kill the noise. Of course you need a magnetic or shimmed coin. I took the shell from a gaff coin trick I don't use and glued a magnet inside it. A small one. Finally I decided I needed a wand or something like a wand to pick up after the vanish to give my palming hand something to do to seem "busy" and holding something, which makes a palming hand look better. This evolved into the silk (grab an end) and the silk suggested a penetration. Adding a dupe coin, does not have to be magnetic or shimmed or anything but normal, - gave me my ending and turned the effect from a vanish into a penetration. The reappearance of "the" coin under the silk immediately gives closure to the trick. A vanish leaves a person wondering where it went. A reappearance breaks that line of thought! A vanish of a coin on top of a silk, silk whisked away to reveal "the" coin under the silk, and perceived as a penetration. Effect: As a perfect icebreaker, you show your left hand to have a silk draped over it with a coin on it. Wave your (almost) flat right hand over the coin, not even touching it, and the coin vanishes! Whisking away the silk, the coin is seen to have reappeared instantly on the other side of the silk. Looks like magic. One interesting thing to me is that I still consider it a sleight-of-hand trick since I classic palm the bottlecap and magnet and not some tape or stickum or pull!

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Required: Silk. Shimmed coin. Dupe coin. Palm magnet. Set-up: Regular coin on left palm. Silk over this. Shim coin on top of silk. Palm magnet in right classic palm. Performance: Icebreak! Say, "Watch the coin", and wave your right hand over the shim coin and of course it jumps to the palm magnet and vanishes. This part is every bit as good as Raven. Grab a hanging corner of the silk with your right, and whisk silk away to reveal dupe coin on left hand. Pocket silk and magnet and shim coin in a right pocket. Next “time” we’ll start here with more palm magnet effects. -fin-

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September 2012, Number 6 Based on a trick Doug Edwards showed me that he did not invent but he change (improved?) the ending. I changed the ending ... and in fact the whole trick … a different way except for the basic concept. I don’t know the inventor. *** Those who follow my newsletters will remember a 4 Ace cutting trick (I really used 4 Queens … no matter) and this trick (which I now do instead of the other [!]) but it only needs 3 of the 4 false cuts I taught for the 4 Ace/(4 Queens) thing. Effect: A group pf cards is shown to a viewer and the request made to memorize 1 of the “group”. Note: the “group” is always 3 cards but you don’t say that. You refer to the group as a group. “Please memorize 1 card of this group”. “Thank you “ (Sort of act like the number of cards doesn’t matter – get it?) 2) Put these on the deck and give the deck your best false cut! Take off 3 cards as if 3 other cards (really the same 3) and show to someone not real close to the first viewer (who should be on your left, and now use a spectator near the middle. Same thing … “Memorize one card of this group!” “Thank you”. After, put the “group” on the deck and give another false cut as you move to the right. 3) Now take seemingly another 3, but really the same 3, off the deck and show to a 3rd viewer near your right side of the room. ***

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Several things … see, we’re thinking “room” not like “close-up” guys who don’t. Ours is more like parlor, platform, or even small stage thinking. (Play big). Also … each time you show the fan of cards right in their face! This is mainly to prevent a lot of people from seeing the “group” … only the “viewer”! As the great swordfighter Miamoto Mushashi used to write “consider this carefully”. 4) Ok. Put those last 3 cards on the deck. Give deck another false cut. *** Finally, announce the trick proper. You will “attempt to find the cards they are only “thinking of”. (A “stretch” … but good “mental” magic). A) So … do another false cut and deal out the top card of the deck (one of the “chosen” cards), face down for now. B) Again … a different but good false cut if possible … or just do your best one! Deal top card face down after cut. (Another “forced card”) C) Finally do another false cut and deal top card face down and pocket deck … we now only need the 3 face down cards. D) To End … turn the three cards face up and ask … (to one spectator) “Did I get yours?” [Don’t ask which one of course.] Next, without pausing say to another “chooser” Did I get yours? She’ll say “yes” of course. Don’t pause but keep going (next viewer) “Did I get yours?” You’ll get three “yes-es” “yes” “yes” “yes” and they may have all looked at the same card, or 2 may have looked at (“memorized”) the same card and 1 another, or they may (rarely) have all looked at a separate card (best case scenario). But no matter even if they all looked at the same card … it doesn’t matter … the public won’t realize!! They hear yes, yes, yes. And you gather up the three cards and pocket them. Try this out. It is great … you’ll love it. -fin***

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PUSH ME PULL YOU by Greg Webb This is an item I’m trying to get manufactured but as yet no cigar. I’ll lay out the whole trick. This has been under wraps for many years. Jeff McBride wrote me he liked it when I sent him a prototype. Effect: A lit candle is blown out and wrapped in tissue paper. A silk vanishes by disintegrating into confetti. Inside the tissue paper is found the silk, and the lit Candle emerges from under your coat and replaced in your candle holder on table. Required: You’ll have to make some things. Not hard. I’ll go into exquisite detail – don’t worry. I’m not a high-tec guy. All do-able. One item is a specialized pull. The silk is attached to the pull. Drill a hole at the lip – sew it on. To wear the pull, it goes through a belt loop and around the small of back and pins on waistband at your right. The pull will hang near left pocket and the silk is mainly in that pants pocket. This is to avoid fumbling when trying to find silk. Just grasp pull – pretend to take out silk from pocket. It comes automatically.

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To vanish (disintegrate) silk, push into pull and use thumb to draw 1 inch square confetti made of tissue paper (same color as silk … about 10 pieces only) out of bobby pin clips and let these drop and flutter down in front of you as you release pull. Not many seem to realize that there is a “tell” in many magi’s pull work and the confetti hides the zip. More important is that it adds a lot artistically. It can seem as if the silk dissolves away and gets applause all by itself. These large tissue squares are perfect. Glitter is too small to show the way we’d like – as is regular confetti. The Candle Vanish. The candle is a fake make of a short piece of hit candle in the end of a white paper tube. The dupe silk is inside and the candle is in a candle holder. To transform the candle to a silk, light it, pick it up, and also pick up a piece of gift wrap paper (which are white on the inside and colorful on the outside) and as you go to put the candle in the wrap paper, hold the wrap paper so it screens the lower part of your face and as you bring the lit candle behind – blow it out and then wrap it up. Pause. Then crumple up the paper hard and briskly (to break the paper shell of fake) and pause. Let this sink in as part of the effect. The paper wad is smaller than it should be … this begins to imply a vanish occurred. Then make a small tear in the paper ball. Draw out the dupe silk and keep your eyes on it as you drop the paper and crushed fake candle as one into your hat, bucket, or magic wastebasket without even looking because that is how to make it seem like a meaningless piece of scrap. Casual.

Producing the candle: I had a way worked out with a candle in a clip inside a coat … plus a BIC Lighter on a short string pinned inside coat .. but, you know what? The danger of setting a coat on fire accidentally is not worth it. So!! Just have the candle in a pocket. Also have a BIC lighter (there is a small BIC lichger) in the pocket. So just reach in pocket … palm the BIC a la a cigar and bring out the unlit candle … with palmed BIC. Put the candle in a candle holder on table. Produce the BIC a la a cigar or cigarette … light the candle!!

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End of story. See you.

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OCTOBER, Number 7 I was thinking of Jack Chanin who I knew quite well in the 1960's. The reason is that I ran into James Randi when he turned 100! I then remembered that James used a Chanin "move" when he vanished a girl's watch for a large room. As he acted out the "vanish" itself with his right hand, after basically a French Drop (keeping the watch in left hand). So leaning forward to concentrate attention on right hand's acting, the left, with cradled watch, is rested on left knee. After vanish registers with right hand, the left with hidden watch comes off knee as posture changes and watch is produced from behind spectator's ear or wherever. The thing is ...Randi is a very good magician! The "move" in question was from a Jack Chanin routine from his "Chinese Act". I wish I had thought to ask Randi if he knew Chanin ... (I'm sure he did ...conventions or shows or what-not.) ...or if he just got it from a Chanin book (I'm not sure it is in print ... part of the Chinese Act - the silk act [last part of Chinese Act - Chan Jack] is.) Anyway I'll describe the trick and must preface by saying Chanin excelled at using items borrowed from spectators in dangerous ways (knife through coat ... several methods). Here goes: Burned & Restored hanky. He'd borrow a hanky from a lady spectator. Wadded up in his other hand was a burned hanky. He also held a perfume bottle filled with lighter fluid in the hand holding the wadded burned hanky ... for cover. Follow along. He'd sprinkle lighter fluid on the borrowed hanky and then light it! Immediately he'd wad up the burning hanky in his huge hands and kill the flames ... snuff them right out! Now, with the borrowed hanky balled up in his left hand ... he'd open out the pre-burned hanky with both hands, at first, then held it up with his right hand ... and here is the move! The left hand with its balled up borrowed hanky rests on the left knee as the body leans forward (to concentrate on the right hand ... supposedly).

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Then ... the burned hank is balled up ... left comes off knee with its balled up borrowed hanky (still hidden) and hidden in right had as both hands now open out the original unhurt borrowed hanky! There you have it. A memory of Chanin triggered by a memory of Randi. Hey look ... I still have old newsletters to savage!

Jack Chanin was one of the truly great magicians and also very underrated. I would put him in with Vernon, Slydini, Al Flosso, and other names we equate with greatness. Personally, until I saw David Roth in the early seventies, Jack had been the only magician who made everything seem like real magic and not "tricks". I was very lucky to have gotten to know him. This, his handling of the Bluff Shift, is an example of his ability to understand what was lacking in a trick, from a spectator's possible point of view - and fix it. What you do is proceed as with the normal Bluff Shift until you have one card in your right hand which the viewers take to be a half- deck. You might find it advantageous to hold a pinkie break under the top card from the start...then riffle down the left side of the deck with the left thumb until they yell "Stop"! Pick up the break under the top card with the right hand's ball of thumb which is already in place because of the position of the right hand in Biddle Grip arched above and slightly to the right of the deck for support during the riffling-down procedure of the left thumb. Lift the top half-deck, with the break, for the selected card to be taken and noted. As they're looking at the card, kiss the halfdecks and let everything drop from your right except one card (the one above the break). The prior break allows there to be no fumbling or fidgeting during the dropoff. Extend your left hand with 51 cards. Keep this hand low and angled so as to minimize the view of the edge of deck that is really too thick. Have the selection replaced and set the right hand's card, supposedly a half-deck, on the deck making 52. Here's the Chanin Disarrange. As soon as the right's single card hits the deck, and while the right hand screens the deck momentarily, the left thumb nudges the entire top half of the deck to your right. Then the right hand is taken away and the left hand is extended to show the condition of the deck.

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This position with the extended hand and the top half of deck stepped to your right must be allowed to sink in. Then, after you mention that their card is "about in the middle", you square the deck up in a deliberate manner. You've controlled their card and can go into any conclusion you wish depending on your plot. The plot thickens! Stephen Minch just appeared in my lavalamp. Better than the crystal ball and it saves on phone bills. He realized-instantly-that the idea was good, and Stephen is also a Jack Chanin fan, but by working on this idea with deck in hand and having a "clear light" experience, found an improved handling. Backtrack to the point in the procedure when the spectator just selected their card after your riffle-down and "Say Stop". While they memorize their card, and as you secretly drop off all but one card from the right hand group, onto the left half, keep a pinkie break there, between the two half-decks. Maintain that break while they replace their card on the left hand's 51. Lower the right hand's single and as soon as it lands on the deck, and while the right hand still screens but no longer touches anything, straighten in a relaxed way the entire left hand including the left pinkie, and the half deck above the pinkie break will ride to the right. This way there is no left thumb movement necessary and I agree that this is an improved handling on the Chanin Disarrange. Wait-Stephen just disappeared from my lava lamp! -feen-

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MENTAL THOUGHTS - THE BEST KIND So how do we respond to the challenge of being asked about the "Crossing Over" show on Sci-Fi? John Edward is the name of the man who talks to the dead and conveys their messages to the living. If you're not watching and studying this guy, I think you should! And - I don't think we should knock him. I don't think we should adopt the stance, "He's some kind of conman!". When the public does believe in "powers" it is good for all of us. That's a fact. What we can do, to show that we too can do what he does, is to revive all the Living and Dead tests that were popular at one time and then went out of favor when magicians began to think it naughty to make such claims and implications. This is an original piece and related to The Twitch that I ran last year. Effect: Living and Dead test. The "dead" billet moves in an eerie way…perhaps as if haunted.

Required: Three pieces of paper folded in half. A pen with a cap. Regular old invisible thread (no reel) and tape or glue.

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Set-up: Attach one end of the invisible thread to one billett and the other end to the cap of the pen. Put the cap on the pen and all three billets under the clasp on the pen. This is your carrying mode. A briefcase or whatever box or even hat you work out of. This also involves a table.

Just a brief study of this picture will explain the motivating power of the billet. As the cap of pen falls, and lands on the knees and stops, it pulls the thread and attached billet and makes it move just a bit and then stop. Performance: Take out your set, and remove the billets. Ask for the initials of a dearly departed and you write these on the attached billet and fold it just once. Get living people's initials for the other two billets (controls) and fold these loose papers the same way. Put the cap loosely on the pen, and go to put it in your pocket. After you are over the edge of the table, let the cap come off the pen. By now you have to have your other hand steadying the dead billet. Let's say your left hand is on the billet and the right is putting the pen away. The pen is now minus the cap, which dangles by the thread several inches below the near edge of the table. When you are done putting the capless pen away in a coat or pants pocket, bring the right hand above the table too, to mix the billets briefly - almost monte fashion. Here are the details. Slide the dead - threaded - billet with your left fingers and another one with

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your right, exchanging them. Keep pressure on the dead slip until you can pin it also with your now free right hand. Now your left hand is free to move to the left and onehandedly exchange the two ungaffed billets in two moves. You are done, except a brief buildup which also gets their eyes up to your face. Say, "Let's try to get a sign that everything is ok with your loved one", and let go with your right finger pressure. The pen cap will fall, pull the thread, and cause the billet to move across the table for several inches and stop when the cap hits your knees. DARK FRICKIN HUMOR IF YOU PUSHED YOUR OWN CLONE OFF A TALL BUILDING, WOULD THAT BE MURDER, SUICIDE, OR AN OBSCENE CLONE FALL? See you somewhere in time next time.

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November, Number 8 Wholy Moley! I still have old newsletters to devour! Funny… as I was saying to my longtime friend Jeff McBride, after I write an article or “trick”. I seem to forget it right away… to make room for the new thing. I’ll meditate till I think up something new or work out a new twist on something… the more common occurrence, then I usually get ‘jazzed” up about the new thing till I work out the “BUGS” and then write it up and forget it! But while talking with the McBride Master, he told me this story; he did a show in Russia, but none of his props made it!!! (They ended up back in Las Vegas….. he got them back eventually.) But for his show he had to borrow things! My point? Thank god for sleight-of-hand! Take his water bowls … the version Jeff does is with ungimmicked brass bowls. I don’t know how the trick works. I’ve seen it many times. Still … I at least know … no gaffs …. So he just had to borrow brass bowls, not a certain magic prop only available from certain magic shops. And the same with the rest of the show. He was able to borrow stuff that he knew how to do sleight-of-hand routines with … to put on a show. Wow! Makes you think. *** SOMETHING I NEVER WROTE DOWN. HAH? Don’t BURN YOURSELF!

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MATCHBOOK with 1 MATCH STICKING OUT and UP. QUARTER with STICKER … AVERY LABEL (SEE DETAILS) A while back there was a trick with cards and an empty soda can, and Avery Labels. You managed to get a dupe label on a selected card in a very interesting way. The dupe label was sticky side up on a paper napkin. An empty soda can, which have recessed bottom, so label won’t stick, is over the label. At a point in a card trick … a called out card is propped up against the can … vertical. Earlier another label (duplicate) was shown on the back of some card – face not shown. [It was actually on a Joker.] When the can is lifted away … the selection falls on the dupe sticky label … and later the 2 Jokers (for consistency) were taken away … the deck minus the selection with the final label, could be used for something else. That was the trick. About the label(s) which I want to use in this coin trick. First: We need 2 matching quarters (same dates) Next: Avery labels come in many sizes and even colors – peel and stick. Many could work. I’ll describe with an oblong, white label that would fit on a quarter. Concept: The concept here is that instead of having a spectator initial a coin, you yourself just boldly go where no magician has gone before … and bluff this out. * CHECK THIS OUT THEN CHECK IT IN! *

You sign the label. OK! Then … follow carefully ….. You write the wrong date, use yesterday’s date, then act like “Jeez … I did it wrong!” and cross out the wrong date then re-do the date correctly below. This is subtle and subliminal …. Because you already made a dupe, a second

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exact duplicate, of this label … before-hand!!! This one is on the quarter under the match book with the one protruding and vertical match (NOTE: You’ll need another matchbook, or a BIC lighter.) To perform: The matchbook with protruding match with secret dupe quarter with dupe label under it … is on the table, bar, etc. Next – show the dupe quarter … put the next label on this quarter and sign it, date it … make the mistake … cross it out and re-do the correct date underneath the mistake. What supposedly makes this work is that supposedly no one would believe we’d go to all that work just for a “Trick” … but, of course, we’re nuts and would go to all that work to make a “Trick” seem like magic and not a “trick”. Next we need a piece of Flash Paper and you’ll do a coin fold … with the known quarter and label seemingly in the Little Bundle, but it can slip out in time-honored fashion into finger palm. Let’s say you just let slip the coin into R. finger palm. Continue to hold the flash paper with the other hand (take the empty flash paper with left hand in such a way as to hide the fact that the quarter is gone … for instance if any light should want to shine thru, flash paper being thin … hide the middle of bundle with left fingers – catch on?) Go to right pocket – ditch the dupe quarter – get BIC Lighter – come out and light the Match sticking up from matchbook. Put BIC Down. Next, light the flash paper … it will produce “ooh’s” and “ahh’s” just by being flash paper … then they’ll notice the coin is gone!!! Blow out the match! Show your hands clean! Then lift the matchbook gingerly to reveal the coin with matching date plus that label. Let them notice the crossed out error and correction. Don’t mention it (!). OK – lots of magic for them to enjoy. And for you to enjoy. *** See you in time. -NEXTYAY

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December, Number 9 Sometimes I wonder if people can realize what coin magic was like before David Roth…it looked like coin tricks…people’s hands looked odd (Thumb Palms) and nothing really looked like magic…except - well, Slydini was pretty amazing. Chanin could make things look like “MAGIC”. Al Schneider – magic. Well well well – Goshman…except I really hated his presentation. Boston Box – And, yet, I was personally affected by David Roth’s work. Yet again, I couldn’t do his Boston Box Routine and had to come up with my own. I’ve watched Roth do his for what - ? – 30 years…40 years. I’ve seen lectures of his, he showed me many times. I just can’t do one move in particular; picking up a stack of 4 coins with classic palm off of the Boston Box.

*** So…my Routine is completely different except for a Dump Out Fake Out…actually mine is more like Bruce Cervon’s – David’s is dumped forward. Needed – Boston Box, 5 copper English pennies, and 4 silver half dollars. Set up – Put a copper coin semi-permanently in the recess of the Boston Box with double stick tape! Put the Box regular mouth up and put 4 coppers in the Box and put on the lid. The 4 silver coins are off to the side but in view on the table.

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Perform – We can’t just lift the lid to show inside…they’ll see that the 4 coppers don’t fill the Box to the brim. This would only breed confusion…so instead we use the “split the lid and Box in a downward dump” which Kaufman referred to as “like Breaking An Egg”. As the Dump downward is done you must have planned your grip so that your right fingers hide the copper coin in the recess! Now return the Box to a normal orientation and put the silver coins into the Box and as you put the lid on, you do your favorite turnover. (As lid is placed on Box, Box is turned over.) Place inverted Box and lid on your left hand in position to be able to finger palm, with the left hand, when the Box is lifted, after a pause, off of the stack of silvers which remain hidden in slightly necktied and cupped left hand. OK. You can take the Box and lid with left thumb and 1st finger (while still ”Holding Out”) to help hide the coins. (Coins – coppers – still hidden in L. F.P.) After a brief pause, again, pattering I suppose…set Box on table. (Left hand has to be somewhat “necktied” to guard its cargo.) Right hand picks up all the copper coins and classic palms all 4 as you raise right fist…I learned this from Slydini...the high position and angle of right hand allows for getting all 4 well classic palmed at once. Now you’ll seem to “put” the coins into cupped and slightly “necktied” left hand…but really it is a fake “put”. Really, the coins stay in right classic palm while the straightened right fingers go into left hand as if putting something in there. Left hand closes and now the originally finger palmed silvers are just inside the left fist. Right hand moves to Box and lifts lid – the copper in recess of inverted box looks like a full box of coppers! The left fist has raised…you blow on it and dump out silvers on the table. A transposition has occurred! Clean up: Right hand still has 4 coppers in classic palm. I’ll be using a “dump” credited to Bruce Cervon. (David Roth’s seems to dump forward (away from yourself) while this one is dumped into left hand. Pick up the Box with right thumb and 1st fingers and get the other right fingers under Box (so that when “dump” does occur, the right fingers will be hiding the open mouth of inverted box. OK – Proceed to “seemingly dump” contents into left hand. Really the coins from right classic palm are what fall into the left hand which then dumps them, after a pause, onto the table!!! Cool – eh? *** After a pause (love those pauses – you’d be saying something…”And the silvers turn to copper! Yay!”) set the Box down without looking at it on the table – don’t call attention to right hand or Box during this time…there is a slight discrepancy as to the “orientation” of Box…but now put all attention on the coins – show them on both sides, etc.

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Finally put the 4 Silvers into Box and put on lid and put Box away and show 4 coppers on both sides…maybe do a trick with them. FIN Next time in time if we have time.

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New work on the Boston Box. (I thought it was invented in Boston!) (Not... It was invented by a guy named Boston... I don’t know if he was also from Boston... or if he ever visited Boston... I just don’t know or care about details like that... I just think there are some cool tricks possible with the prop. *** That’s my take on this type of thing. I don’t give a fig who Erdnase was... or what Blackstone did in his spare time. Many magazines go for that angle. What intrigues me is the evolution of tricks until they become near miracles. This time... Since it is an invention, there won’t be enough time for much evolution. Here goes: This is not perfected. It is more of a challenge... I’ll try to get Roth to comment on this or invent the right “move”! The idea is that in the recess in the base – instead of glue or double-stick tape to hold a coin semi-permanently in place, we just put it there loose... We’ll have to hold it there with the fingers somehow. Now, next, we have to discuss the nature of the coin in the recess. It is a double-face coin... a C/S coin! The premise of the M.O. of the trick (besides some heavy palming) is that sometimes the lid is lifted off of an inverted Boston Box and the coin shows copper (implying box is full of coppers... really they see the C/S coin.)

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Other times in the routine we need to rotate the C/S coin [secretly] so it shows silver, implying the box is full of silver coins. So far... the move in question is turning into what is like doing a “half-pass” with one card of a deck... The bottom card... As popularized by Aaron Fisher and others... But doing it with the C/S coin in the recess of the Boston Box.

After learning to do it... you then must learn to do it silently! Then you must learn to do it with coins palmed in the left and right hands!!! *** Then after doing the turnover of the C/S coin... You then have to do a turnover of the O.Box (Boston variety). *** The good news is... You only have to do the turnover of the C/S coin once. *** The effect: I’m going to include parenthetically the missing fine points of the M.O as I relate the effect. The box is shown empty (by right hand, with 4 English Pennies palmed, lifting lid of Boston’s Box.) lid is replaced and box turnover is accomplished. Now lid is lifted and copper side of the C/S coin shows. Pretend to dump coins out of the box – Really, the coins fall from right palm as you act out a dump. (to table) *** Surprise!... You have also been palming 4 silver coins in left hand during all of this. In any case... Left holds LID and right FINGERS hide the bottom (supposedly) of box as dump down, so the opening to BOX PROPER isn’t seen so that it is a secret that box is inverted. *** After misdirection, patter away, etc., set box down with real opening up and in view. 4 copper coins on table! ***

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Next: (Note: Left still holds 4 SILVER COINS). As pick up box and put LID ON, 2 things must happen. First – reverse the C/S coin, then reverse the box under the lid... as lid is placed on. (Actually – after lid is placed on but while sort of adjusting lid as if to make sure it is “seated” correctly) Next... Lid is lifted after some magical gesture or “word”, and the SILVER side shows! To “dump” this time, the LID is taken to the right side (right hand) and the left fingers cover bottom (actual mouth) of Boston Box during DUMP. Actually, the SILVER coins fall from left classic palm. “Right” the box as set down after misdirection of some sort. * 8 coins, 4 copper – 4 silver- have come out of one empty box -FIN-

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I think we all have dreamed of being as good at the "real work" with cards as a Darwin Ortiz or a Derren Brown, whose video I've been studying. But, you know what? Most of us are not quite good enough to make lots of real hard sleights look effortless. Another thing is that laymen, at a party, don't want to have to concentrate on real complex plots. That is why I've been hard at work cleaning up various items so that they are so direct that it seems like I did nothing - but something happens. This article has to do with an old old spelling spell. The way I've always seen this is confusing and I'll tell you why and describe my fix and recommend that you use this and get in on the fun. It is only a good thing to change a trick for the better.

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This is easier and stronger magic than before, so read on. Effect: If you use a BEE back deck, the joker or "bug" is a picture of a Bee. Or use any joker from any deck. Lay the Joker on the table while saying something about him being the Spelling Champion. A card is selected and lost, and the deck cut and joker inserted face up and deck completed. Spectator does the above. Spreading out the deck, the Bee is seen. Asking the name of the selection, you state that the Bee can spell and find card! Performance: In earlier incarnations of this trick, a second card is selected, cut in, and by spelling this second card, the first card is found. See how confusing. By using the joker - a non-card, almost - and setting it out on the table, we eliminate that confusion with the second card. And we spell the name of the selection, not the name of the second card to find the first card, so. It makes it all much clearer. I also changed the handling so it is a joy to do. Have a card selected. Bring it to the top. Add three cards. I show a fan of three from the bottom to be "not yours" and when I replace them on the bottom I keep a break and soon double undercut them to the top, making the selection 4th from top. Have layman or laylady cut deck, put joker on original top, and complete the cut. They did the cutting which means a lot to laymen and layladies. You are done. The secret is that the name (only) such as Jack or Ace, of any card is spelled with three or four or five letters. There are no extra moves...just where you start your spell. If a 3 letter word, such as Ace, just start the spell one card below Joker in the spread, and use the very next card as the one you mean. It'll be the selection. For 4 letters like the "Five" - start one below the joker and the very card you land on will be the selection. If 5 letters such as the word "Eight", start your count on the Joker, and end right on the selection. A very important consideration is to remind the spectator that, "I didn't put the Joker in, YOU DID!", and this is what sells the trick. What is fun about performing for laymen is that they don't know that Darwin Ortiz or Derren Brown do more complex tricks than this. If you act like this is a miracle - they will too. The laymen. By all means work on your complex routines at the magic club, but realize that laymen need something they can follow, when performing for laymen.

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In conclusion, realize that your friends and family no longer react like laymen because they have seen your development with the ol' pasteboards. Get out to Kiwanis Club meetings or whatever it takes to be working for real people who haven't lived with a young magician in their midst. And try this trick. Then you'll believe me and not until. AFTERIMAGES: When you spread the deck out and the face up BEE is seen, it works best with the simple plot to take the BEE (joker) out of the spread and make a small separation in the spread to make it clear where it was, and do the spelling while holding the BEE and using it like a pointer! This way it is more as if the BEE was doing the spelling to find their card! Thank you. Well, as Time Traveler fades into history I would like to say … Time Capsule will continue. As for Spell Check Bee … you might think it is too simple but I always hated the ones where you could spell many cards … but had to “fudge” the spell. “Ace Clubs” not “Ace of Clubs”, sometimes but not always. This one is simple but Jackie Flosso loved it!

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Special Issue: on Pendulums & Dowsing Rods.

Also known as DIVINING RODS. Pendulums can be made from a key on a string. Or you can buy them. These have been known at times as SEX DETECTORS… To tell what someone's baby would be in the days before technology (ultrasound and tests on the amniotic fluid). But… they can be used (supposedly) to tell the answer to any YES or NO question. I suggest using one in the end to some mental card trick – set-up deck, key card, etc. It doesn't matter. Just think of this as the ending… The REVEAL (!) (The deneaument) as it were. Note: of course I didn't invent this… I'm just suggesting that if we revive this… we'll make more money and a cult following and maybe an occult following. So… after card is lost in the deck after a so fair selection & return & shuffle – they can shuffle too after your glimpse of key card or whatever. Even a force. Then take out five cards (one of which is the target) and lay them out face down. Do the pendulum thing over each, straight-line swing = YES, circle = NO. Reveal the "selection" this way. No biggie except to laymen who will find it more mystical than standard card trix.

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You could have a force deck and 4 odd cards at top or bottom or both (2 at top, 2 at bottom) then have a very fair selection and return [force card]. Then take out one force card plus your 4 odd cards (after false cuts, let's say). Very "fair looking". Do a deck switch at end for a regular deck missing those 5 cards. End clean. Dowsing rods – the wire kind from Russia. Get two empty spools for thread. Put a coathanger wire, bent as shown, into the hole. Make 2 of these.

Now when you hold the spool in your fist… the tilt of your fist controls where the wire points (!) You'll have to practice this to get it natural. In my mind, the way to use this is to play big – have a card selected. Returned, shuffle – shuffle – cut – cut. O.K. Now get 5 people up from the audience and just note who gets your "target" card. Then introduce the "DIVINING RODS" and eventually after much by-play, they finally both point at the person with the card. Wow. Seriously, I think this dresses up a simple card trick into something mystical. – Enjoy – Gregg Webb, 2013

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Issue 1, 2014 Time Travel was too hard. So I decided to just plant old newsletters … yes I still have some left over … and make “Time Capsules” of them and just wait for y’all to catch up! IMPERSONATION ACES by Gregg Webb This is fun the way JUMPING GEMINI by Darwin Ortiz is fun. A lot happens with just a small packet in the hands and there is a big ending! Effect: The four Aces are removed from a normal deck, and the rest of the deck is put in a pocket. It isn't needed. It is announced that the "lesser" Aces are jealous of how fancy the Ace of Spades is, and therefore, the other Aces like to impersonate the Ace of Spades. All four aces are shown to look just like the ace of spades. The magician explains that in a poker game, five cards make up a hand. Spreading the packet face down and a fifth card is seen to have appeared. Not showing this card's face, the magician says, "This fifth card...the SEVEN OF HEARTS also likes to impersonate the Ace of Spades. The card is shown to also now look just like the Ace of Spades. Counting and showing five Aces of Spades, the magician continues, "If you are caught with FIVE ACES OF SPADES in a game, you are in big trouble, so what I do is to convince the Ace of Clubs to impersonate the Ten of Spades." A ten of spades is shown. "Then I get the Ace of Hearts to impersonate the Jack of Spades." A jack of spades is shown. "Next, I get the Ace of Diamonds to impersonate the Queen of Spades." A queen of Spades is displayed, "and the Seven of Hearts to impersonate the King of Spades". A king of spades is shown. And with the addition of the enviable Ace of Spades, played by himself, we have a Royal

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Flush, the hand that can't be beat." AND, YOU ARE CLEAN. History: I created this sequence for myself years ago, with different patter. I remember showing it to Shigeo Futagawa at the time and that he was puzzled when the fifth card appeared. Then I forgot it but lately came across it in my notes but decided to improve the patter. While the moves have existed, and similar routines exist, I’m sure, it is the exact sequence and the patter that makes for a trick that has the right chemistry to qualify as something you'd really do for people. Set-up: Remove the ten through the Ace of Spades, and the three other Aces. Lightly bridge the 10 of Spades concave and in the lenghtwise direction. Put the 10-King of Spades cards face down on the deck proper, with the 10 of Spades on top. Note: this won't be used to pick up a certain amount off the deck in any way, but for later in the trick. Put the Aces face up on top of deck. The Ace of Spades should be the lowermost of the face up aces. Performance: With deck in left dealing position, spread over at least 8 cards. The Aces will be seen face up, followed by the face down deck. I'll give the complete patter at the end. For now we'll concentrate on learning the trick's mechanics. As you square the cards, get a left pinkie break under the top 8 cards. Pick up the packet of 8 by the right hand using Biddle Grip. The audience should think you just have the Aces. We are going to show the Aces one-by-one, and in the process we will unload three aces back onto the deck, keeping the Ace of Spades and the rest of the Royal Flush cards in play. In many tricks we are told to use a move called ATFUS (Anytime Face Up Switch) but instead I favor using J. K. Hartman's SECRET SUBTRACTION, which is the exact opposite of an old famous move called the (Fred) Braue Secret Addition. We'll use the secret subtraction move three times in a row. ATFUS removes the three at one time, but I feel the J. K. Hartman used the way I'll teach is more consistent. Use the left thumb to peel the first ace off the packet and onto the deck. Use the right hand's packet to lever the ace face down and then push it under the right hand packet but keep a ball of thumb break with right thumb between this face down ace and rest of packet. Now you can raise right hand to flash the ace to the viewers. Next, as you go to peel the next ace, you unload the "broken" ace onto the deck and then peel the next ace and proceed to do all the above actions again. Flip ace face down and

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push it under packet, keeping a break. Raise right hand to show it. Repeat the above, unloading the third ace onto deck. At this point the Ace of Spades is face up on a face-down packet that only contains the royal flush. Peel the Ace of Spades, but you don't have to unload anything. Turn it face down and push it under packet. Pocket the deck in a left pocket. We're done with it. SHOWING FOUR ACES OF SPADES The sequence to come is Larry Jennings' handling of an Ed Marlo concept and the use of the longitudinal bridge to help with the "pinkie pulldown" technique is my innovation. First off, we want to move the 10 of Spades with the slight crimp to the bottom of the packet, just below the Ace, from the top. I get a break under the top card, the 10, and double undercut it to bottom. We're ready. Pull down the crimped card with left pinkie so you can turn a block of four, squared as if only one card, over face up onto the one card remaining face down in left mechanic's grip or "dealing position". Turn the quadruple face down with the same technique. Take the top single card between right thumb and first finger as if this is the card they were just shown. Repeat the pulldown technique to allow your right fingers to turn over a "triple" as one, again showing the Ace. The card in your right hand, which mustn't flash, won't hamper this action much. You'll get it with a bit of practice. Turn the triple face down onto "packet" and take the top card as if it were another Ace under the card in right hand, making a fan of two cards. Now, even though you hold two cards with your right thumb and first finger, you must use your other fingers to turn over a double, squared, face up on the left's packet. The Ace shows again. Using the same "pulldown" technique always, turn the double face down on the packet and push over only the top card and take it under the two in the right hand, making a fan of three. The two in the left hand must stay squared as if one card. This double is placed on top of the right hand's card and all is squared. Turn up the top single card and show a "fourth" Ace. Turn it face down. We owe a great deal to the memory of the late great Larry Jennings for this beautiful sequence. Now I double undercut the top face down card to the bottom. SHOWING FIVE ACES

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The next sequence, to show supposedly 5 Aces is the work of Bro. John Hamman, and is called the Flustration Count. First we must make the fifth card appear. Up until now we've been careful to keep the fifth card squared and hidden. Now simply spread out five face down cards and take the lower one with your left hand and hold it towards yourself and here you'll be miscalling it as the seven of hearts, then saying it too likes to impersonate the Ace of Spades. Then show it to the audience as the Ace. Put this card face down under the other cards in your right hand and square. For the Flustration Count take the packet in Biddle Grip with the right hand and rotate it so the Ace at the face can be seen by the audience. Return the packet to a face down position and peel the top card into the left hand. Now just repeat this four more times. In between each "peel" into the left hand there is a flash to the audience of the Ace of Spades at the face of the packet. The move has a discrepancy in that the card they are shown and the card peeled are not the same. Yet, when done at the right tempo (briskly) an optical illusion occurs, especially to non-magicians, and it looks like 5 Aces of Spades or whatever card you may use in other tricks. The Flustration Count is a utility move that is time- honored and a standard technique in card magic. Now all you have to do is reveal the changes to the Royal Flush one card at a time. FULL PATTER "I once got all four aces in a poker game. I want to tell you what happened. I didn't realize that the Ace of Clubs, the Ace of Diamonds, the Ace of Hearts especially, are jealous of how fancy the Ace of Spades is...so they like to impersonate the Ace of Spades. "When I looked at my hand again, there were one, two, three and four Aces of Spades. "In a poker game you get five cards...so when I got my fifth card...the Seven of Hearts, it too wanted to impersonate the Ace of Spades. "When I looked at my hand again there were one, two, three, four, and five Aces of Spades. "IF YOU GET CAUGHT WITH FIVE ACES OF SPADES IN YOUR HAND IN A GAME, THIS IS NOT A GOOD THING! "So I convinced the Ace of Clubs to impersonate a different card, the TEN OF SPADES. Then I convinced the Ace of Hearts to impersonate the Jack of Spades. I talked the Ace of Diamonds into changing to the Queen of Spades, and the Seven of Hearts into looking like the King of Spades instead. "And, with the original enviable Ace of Spades himself, we have a Royal Flush in Spades...the hand that can't be beat!" THE AFTERBURNER

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You'll have to practice and rehearse this to get the patter to "GO" with the moves. The moves aren't hard, especially if you use the longitudinal bow on the bottom card of packet to make pulling one card only down for each block turnover of the Diminishing Lifts (turnovers) Sequence. If you like to write patter, you might want to try a story line about identity theft! - fin Gregg Webb Bayside, NY

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Issue 2, 2020 Yes … I still have left-over newsletters from the “old days”. Wow.

This uses everything from the previous trick except you don't need the silk. You will need some other props, easy to get. One consideration is that your shim coin must be a head side with date. Effect: Show a coin, a piece of paper, a business card, a book and a pen. Write the digits of the date on the coin in a column on the paper, then total it. A 1983 coin's digits, added, would yield 21. Pick up the book, put the coin on the front cover of the book and cover it with the business card. With a pass of your hand, the coin vanishes and appears down in the book - at PAGE @!!! Required: Palm magnet. Shimmed or magnetic quarter. Dupe quarter with matching date. Book. Business card. Paper. Pen. Performance: Full patter: "The date on this coin is 1983. If I total the digits, I get "21". I learned this from a Russian gypsy. If I cover the coin with this business card, and pass my shadow on it...the coin disappears and then reappears at...page 21." Details: When ready to make your pass - the left fingers hold the business card at spot "X", to keep card from moving. The coin is attracted to the palm magnet in right palm from the start, and as you move hand away, the coin is dragged along under card until it clears card and jumps onto palm magnet. Reveal the vanish with the left hand picking up card. By now the right hand has picked up pen (like a wand, it gives the right hand a

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less suspicious nature to be holding something), and point with it to the total on the paper and then pocket pen and magnet and shim coin AS YOU ALREADY ARE OPENING THE BOOK's COVER WITH YOUR LEFT HAND. As the right hand emerges free from pocket ditch, it also helps find the coin that is the dupe that was secreted in the book at page 21 from the start.

***

Deluxe Color Change as Vanish I believe the origin of this move is Dai Vernon in Stars of Magic - Ace Assembly... for the last vanish. It is a standard color change with the emphasis changed from making a card change color to making it look like you took a card away from the face of deck or packet with palm down and almost flat right hand. The right hand acts out crumbling and disintegrating the card it supposedly took away. Actually the right takes nothing. Instead, it leaves behind a card it already held palmed on the face card of deck or packet to "change" the look of deck or packet only as a convincer that the right hand in fact took a card as it pretends to do. The main thing I have done is to routine this as an icebreaker, and I have changed the number of cards initially palmed in the right hand to two...for a "convincer" touch. I'll include three endings although I prefer using this to get into Ambitious Card, as you'll see. (My GOD, Martha! This is a GREAT ragazine.) Effect: Walk up to a group and say "Watch the Queen of Spades!". You seemingly take the Queen off the deck and make it vanish. Then you remove the face card from the deck to show an indifferent card. This disarms the possibility of reconstruction to include the idea that a card was deposited to hide the Queen when you implied you took the Queen away. The Queen eventually ends up on top of the deck when turned face down. I'll give three endings and explain how to segue to Ambitious Card.

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Required: A deck. A dupe Queen of Spades for just one version. Set-up: Specifically designed as an icebreaker, when you want to "cut to the chase quickly", you get ready for this before approaching your next victims. Walkaround stuff for mingle and do magic with no table situations. Deck is face up in the left hand, with a left pinkie break under QS. The right hand in biddle position already has two indifferent cards in its palm. In one case I'll describe, you need a dupe QS in your right pocket. Performance: You are about to pretend to take the QS away with your palm down right hand. Actually, as you do this, instead just deposit the two cards from right palm. Then the hard part begins. Act as if you took the QS in your right hand, which actually has air palmed. Simulation! Move a foot to the right of deck, and slowly start a crumbling action. It should be noted that the left pinkie maintains its break and now is under three cards of the deck which is face up. Finally reveal the vanish. This is a strong vanish when acted out right. Next, remove the face card of deck to show QS not there. Because we deposited two, this is possible. Replace and now the pinkie still holds its break under three. With no fubling to get ready, do a triple undercut to move the three face cards to the rear, and turn deck face down. QS is now face down on top of face down deck. Now we're ready for our options. ENDINGS: The ending I use the most is this. As soon as deck is flipped face down after the triple undercuts, palm the QS. Say. "If I want the QS on top, I reach up, make it reappear and just drop it on top when no one is looking." Reach up and produce from the air with these details. Move quickly to straddle grip. Get thumb in between card and palm. Turn palm up and transfer grip to middle fingers at far end and thumb at near end. Now card is held about three inches above palm. We don't want to expose the palm position itself. Drop on top. Go into Ambitious card. #2 - Double turnover to show QS not on top. Replace double and snap fingers and then show QS on top. Go Ambitious Card. #3 - Produce dupe QS from pocket, drop on top, go into tricks that take advantage of the dupe. COINS * * * COINS Holding Back Two!! First I’ll explain a simple and workable way to palm 2 of 4, and then I’ll run the routine from an old newsletter. ***

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Ok – have 4 matching coins on right hand. [Note: When I say “workable” I mean for intermediate coinmen. Sorry.] Ok – again – now close right first and classic palm all 4 coins. If you have trouble with this … simple ... give up coins and take up knitting. Seriously folks, I have trouble describing how to palm a whole group of coins at once. I’ve always featured Han Ping Chien … have a different “touch” on it from most guys … and I learned it then … when learning HPC. Anyway … next let 2 drop (inside the loose fist) onto fingers (bent fingers or fingertips rest). Now show the left hand, then dump 2 into the left and close right away so audience doesn’t see that only 2 have been dumped. Next comes a little “touch” that comes from the days of “hanging” with Geof Latta and early David Roth and it goes like this. You can make the two in left sound like 4 (or so) when you shake and rattle the left first by practicing how tight to hold the left fist when rattling!!! Sometimes something like that is all I’d “catch-on” to at a session and therefore I’d practice the new thing all week. Note, there is a harder but better method for holding back 2 of 4 that I’ll explain next issue. The idea of holding back 2 has been around a long time. It is only now with this new method for how to do it that the best routine for its use comes into its own. Show four on R. Palm two. Drop the loose two into the L. Audience should believe all four are in L. We're 2 ahead. Make a gesture and produce 1 from R. Pick it up again. Another gesture and the SOUND of 2 in R is caused by crisply classic palming the 1st produced against the one still in classic. Webb's Click Classic Palm. Slap the 2 in L down. Pretend to pick them up but manage to have them extending out of heel of hand for upcoming HPC. As pretend to slap 2 down with R, really keep those 2 palmed and during HPC the 2 from L leak out onto table, seeming to be the 2 from R. Pick these 2 up with R. We're 2 ahead again, and now have all 4 coins in R. Make a gesture with left fist, but don't open it. Produce 3 with R. Pick them up. Make a final gesture with L and OPEN IT to show clean. Produce 4 one by one from R to end.

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Instead of HPC you can substitute David Roth’s handling of Tenkai Pennies designed for large coins! It is perfect for when no table. *** Richard Kaufman included 9 Card Problem by Jim Steinmeyer. Mine is better. Of course mine is only an improvement on the previous, but better it is.

They say nobody is perfect, but who says a card trick can't be perfect? This is my "take" on Jim Steinmeyer's 9 CARD PROBLEM. The name itself invites us to try variations. It appeared in the NEW INVOCATION, and was discussed by Richard Kaufman in MAGIC Magazine before he moved to GENII. GENII Magazine ran two variations on this by David Regal. These two versions had "kicker" endings. I decided to eliminate the kicker endings approach because those involve forcing the card. I feel the fair selection improves the trick over the kicker endings which to me add novelty yet scream - "FORCE!" While not a major miracle such as the card ending up in Fort Knox or something - it is the type of thing that you can use when you just want to say, "Want to see a great card trick?" It has no explanation. I can't figure out why it works. This situation makes for infectious enthusiasm. That's why I like it. Let's begin by shuffling your deck and have the spectator take out nine cards without looking at them. Set the deck aside. Fan the nine cards and have a card selected. Then have it memorized. As you close the fan, catch a pinkie break beneath the top two face down cards. For the return, just lift the two cards above your break, and have the card replaced on the left hand's group. Drop the right hand two cards on top of all to end this phase. The audience thinks the card is at a random number in the middle. Really it is third from the top. I can't think of a more casual control for this spot. In Regal's versions, he asked the spectator to either lie or tell the truth in the middle phase. I decided to simplify this to "I want you to lie about the name of your card. Don't forget its true identity, but for now LIE. Call out the name of any other card in the whole deck." Let's assume the call is Six of Clubs for the lie. Deal into a pile, one at a time, spelling S-

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I-X. Drop the rest of the cards on top. Pick up all nine cards. Now deal two singles as you spell O-F. Drop all the rest on top. Each time you drop the talon on top of the dealt/spelled cards, actually say, "...and the rest get dropped on top". Finally, pick up all and spell singly C-L-U-B-S and drop the talon on top and pick up all. A note here is that if Diamonds is called as the lie, when you spell Diamonds singly, you will be left with one card only as your talon. I've found it best for consistency to hide this fact by still saying "and the rest go on top" and not letting the number be obvious just to avoid any confusion. You are done except for the opening of the champagne. "You lied about the name of your card. But...if I spell "TRUTH", we'll find your REAL card that you picked." At this point, because of a kind of higher math that I don't fathom, their original card is in the MIDDLE. (No matter what card they name when lying! Perhaps the principle is Roaming Inverse Sets, which I also don't understand.) No matter. I only need to be a pasteboard jockey. In fact I enjoy not knowing how this works. Since TRUTH spells with 5 letters, it will spell whether you go from the top or bottom, so I give them a choice. If from the top deal facedown. If from the bottom, hold the packet in a glide grip and pull the cards out from the bottom, face down. You don't have to do a glide, just use that grip. Set the card aside face down when you get to the "H" in truth, so you can turn over all 8 other cards before revealing the selection. What is really great is that this is one of the few tricks that improves with repeating. When you do repeat, use a different spectator and 9 newly selected cards. A good punch ending after several repeats is this. After it is in the center after the lie spells, fan the cards towards yourself and glimpse the true selection (center card) and while closing the fan face down, get a break under the center card. Do a Leipzig side steal palm and then take the rest in biddle grip with your right. Slide out the top card, an X card from the eight, and turn it towards yourself and MISCALL it the name of their true selection. This fact alone, that you know the name, gets a tiny surprise, but plow on by setting the now seven cards with your right hand, keeping the palmed card concealed, and set the left hand's X card on top of this tabled pile. Turn them all over quickly and spread them to show eight cards. Their true card is missing. Produce from pocket. Steve Minch liked it! Like I said, mine makes more sense than the original or the one in Kaufman’s book for the public. And while on the subject … the public doesn’t really remember details of tricks … and …

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in case you don’t know … variations on tricks is all it takes to even fool magicians. So don’t worry about public exposure. - Next time in time -

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Time Capsule 3535 if man is still alive and I still have old newsletters to cut & paste...or...new ideas or new variations on old ideas...or a combination of the above ... here at last...a standup piece by Gregg Webb...hopefully there are still people doing standup when this is uncovered! Improved Egg at Fingertips Aka Egg on Hand. Derived from Egg on fan (but better) Effect: Similar to egg on hand but simpler. Props: Weller rubber egg or make up the original membrane method from a real egg. The instructions in The Art of Magic by Tommy Downs (aka J. Northern Hilliard) are the best ever. But...the Weller is better, less mess. White flower - real or fake (isn't stage & platform magic wonderful?) and carnation or rose or other...doesn't matter!!! In earlier version of my trick, I had the flower in a small vase. Eliminate, eliminate, eliminate, the vase, vase, vase. (just like I eliminated the Fan, fan, fan.) * But you will still need a glass (a wineglass is nice) and a real uncooked egg. Performance: I'll explain this as if you have the props behind (on a shelf) of a side table (please don't let your side table have a rabbit or such on it...you know, a cartoon that says "Isn't Magic Silly?"). Anyway when ready for this number, reach behind and bring out glass and put on top of side table. Then reach both hands behind the table. Grasp the real uncooked egg with the left hand and then that same left hand grasps the flower. (the flower acts like a wand - something to hold to hide the egg which is in a Cardini cradle palm (loose fingerpalm … almost a loose fist). In earlier version there was also a small vase... not necessary. The right hand grasps the Weller rubber egg and performs a move which we will use again...basically Keith Clark's method of thumb palming a cigarette wherein the right middle & ring fingers carry the object (in this case a rubber egg, which is first quickly collapsed...then compressed into a small wad [using all fingers] then the middle & ring fingers carry the wad into thumb palm. Tyros tend to use the first finger & second finger to thumb palm, but the Keith Clark (second method) is superior since it allows the first finger to maintain a natural slight bend. So...step away from the table (or if this is your opener...you can be in position with said props as you enter or when curtain opens etc.) looking at the flower. Reach into flower with right fingers as if to pluck a petal from flower...but really you produce the waddded

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up Weller egg from the thumb palm with the reverse process than that taught (i.e. use middle and ring fingers to carry wad out of thumb plam...not the more common first & second) to bring it out of thumb palm. Use the flower to screen the action from audience! *** Now bring "petal" away from flower and instead of the fan...or even "bouncing" it on hand...we will just manipulate the petal at the fingertips.

It will seem to grow, controlled to be very slow, by the fingers as shown. When it is full size, that is when you can toss and catch the egg maybe once. So...we have eliminated the fan and the bouncing. Now to prove it's real! Set down the flower. Left hand has real egg in cradle palm...a loose fist kind of finger palm...the key feature of which is the thumb can be seen to be free...not holding something. (That is important). Now we're going to do a jumping shuttle pass...pretending to loft the right hand's rubber egg (which is in view) over to the left hand which will seem to catch it. (Not to be confused with the Sylvester Pitch...which many do confuse it with.) Details: As the right "tosses" to the left...actually it thumb palms (crushes & thumb palms) the rubber egg. This is much like thumb palming a spongeball...but most make the mistake of using first and second while we are using second and third fingers (Keith Clark's) as explained previously. This happens on the downstroke...the get-ready as it were, for the toss. The toss itself is acting as far as the right hand is concerned...besides not flashing thumb palmed rubber egg. (a slight body turn to your left is a good idea.)

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*** What the left hand has to do is...while seeming to turn palm up (as if to catch "something") it lofts the real egg slightly into the air (less is more) and to your left... slightly (less is more) then re-catches the real egg in view, when palm up. Display it. *** Learn each hand separately, then put it all together! *** Right hand with rubber egg squashed & palmed...picks up the wine glass. Left hand crack egg on rim of glass and does a one-handed separartion of the two halfshells (like doing billiard ball manipulations) and let the inner part of the egg drop into glass proving it "real". Then drop the shells in glass, too, to end. FIN

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Time Capsule 4545 Great to report there is still a FISM. What's not great is they are still awarding Juggling. Flourishes are great, but juggling as "magic" is not. Audiences politely applaud skill...don't get me wrong, they will applaud skill...but the experience of magic is completely different. Let me give an example: When Al Schneider does MATRIX...audiences swear that he didn't do anything, therefore the coin's movements must be magic. The audience reaction to magic (when the audience rules out everything they can think of as a possible method...left with nothing but the explanation "It must be magic!") may be different from the applause given to a good juggler...it is mixed with ooh's, and ahh's, and oh's...because Magic is different from juggling! We joke sometimes about how some magicians claim that the audience was so stunned that they forgot to applaud...but in a way there can be some of that. I think the reason many magicians mix comedy in with their magic is so that the people can relate...if the magic is so pure that it mystifies instead of amuses, the applause may be less but this is like comparing apples & oranges. (By-the-way, not many magicians are good enough to not have to rely on jokes to "entertain". Let's cut to the chase - along came the Buck Brothers and lo-and-behold we had "Extreme Manipulation". I wish it had been called "Extreme Flourishes", because manipulation means that you use sleights - on stage or platform usually (although there are some close up manipulation pieces - Cups and Balls as just one example) and the idea was to make it look like magic - stuff appeared & disappeared and changed...you know, Magic!!! All of a sudden we had people doing what in the old days was what a jongluer did (French). It was an art between juggling and magic (closer by far to juggling). *** This same group of new jonglers (jongling is my Americanization of the art & jongler the Americanization of the practitioner) when watching magic...if they can figure a trick out...they assume laymen wouldn't be fooled. Wrongly - and it is because they don't understand that they've had "inside information" about magic, enough to see how a trick is done but not enough to do magic, only to criticize it. *** Another aspect to all this is that the "jonglers" only show what they do to their magic friends...never to "real people". This leads to them eventually "competing" in magic club sanctioned contests or shows (organized by magicians for magicians). Finally, if they

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succeed...they go to FISM (organized by magicians, officiated by magicians, for magicians.) *** Anyway...now all this has finally infiltrated my favorite area - Billiard Balls. "They" think any of the magic possible with them wouldn't fool anybody...so they get rid of the magic and beef up the juggling. Juggling with Billiard Balls! *** One young guy is actually winning contests...getting booked for conventions, and slated to compete at FISM. I asked him, "Do you ever do shows for laymen? You know, Kiwanis clubs, Rotary clubs (I don't know if they still exist), Ladies Auxiliary of the Mothers Against Bizarre Magick, whatever, so you know there are no magicians there, only laymen!" (My experience is these are the better audiences...they don't know magic so you are able to make them feel genuine amazement!!! What was the young guy's answer? "I'd rather perform for magicians. They appreciate the skill." Let's analyze this: First off...he can't compare...he only performs for magicians; second, he's a juggler...he doesn't really know how to get ahead (one ahead would be plenty) of an audience, so the phases build better and better and the final phase is so clean that the audience has no explanation and experiences magic. *** And so in conclusion...these guys have never experienced an audience having a magical moment they created! Never! They don't know how! (It is a separate skill...which is meant to be a secret skill and juggling is an open display of skill which can earn applause but is completely different from magic. There is a similar argument about comedy and magic too, which I may wax long and loud on someday. -FIN-

O. Box Through Table by Gregg Webb John Carney had a way for just the box, no lid, to penetrate a table, leaving the stack of coins (and lid) on top of the table. (I think I thought of mine before I heard of John

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Carney's method...but I'm not sure.) In any case, in mine, both the lid and box go through! Needed: O. Box, standard. Coins. Double-Stick Tape (Scotch). Deluxe version of routine requires an extra box and lid. Setup: Coins are not in box to begin. Inside the lid is a half-inch square of double-stick tape. Extra box & lid on lap for deluxe end. Perform: Put coins in box, as you put lid on box, really you do a "turnover move" and now box is upside down (coins inside, lid is stuck to base (bottom) of O. Box). It looks ok. Set on table. Now, classic palm the Lid (which is stuck to the rest of box) and lift straight up until coins clear. Stack of coins alone is seen on table!! Deluxe ending: bring up the dupe box & lid with left hand, from lap (under table) as right hand laps the lid and box it holds, as a unit. For the less than deluxe ending, lap the lid & box from right hand, show both hands clean, and then duck them under table, to lap where now resides the lid/box. Pull them apart, separating the double-stick tape, and bring them up...one piece in each hand. Don't flash the double-stick tape. -FINAfter images: I write very few routines for lapping these days, but this one was slated for Genii but Richard the "K" lost it during the "move" several years back, and I forgot about it until now. Probably could be done at a bar or next to a table without the lapping, but you couldn't show right palm before going South...not a big problem. Just say something bold and do it! Best, Greg Webb, 2011

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Time Capsule 5555 Well, back in 2012 Gregg ran a bunch of bonus issues, new stuff instead of the rehashes (albeit with some updates). Then he ran out of new bonus things and went back to old stuff which won’t be reopened, or unsealed, until 5555 AD! (Yay!) This trick ran in 2000 or 2001. Trimatrix Plus with 3 quarters and 3 cards and there is a kicker ending … producing 3 larger coins of a different color, English pennies unless you can classic palm old silver dollars. Setup: Right hand classic palms 1 English penny and 3 quarters. In left pocket are 3 cards and 2 English pennies.

Quarters There are two coins close to you, and the single coin is farther away. This is your performer's view. A. B. and C. are also the order the coins will be covered. Reach in your left pocket with your left hand and classic palm one English penny and bring the other one out hidden under the three cards. Next we'll count and show the cards. Hold as shown, which is conducive to Kaps/Malini Subtlety to hide the load coin in right palm.

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Take one card with the left hand, and do a wrist turn to flash the other side. Care must be taken to not turn too far and expose the load in left palm. Return to normal palmdown position and slide the card under the stack, yet above the clipped coin under packet. Since the right is clipping the coin by its extreme right side, just relax pressure and the left side droops so card can enter between card and coin. Repeat this two more times, until all three cards have been taken from top, shown on other side, returned to normal, and slid under packet but above load coin under packet. This is easy. Now packet and hidden coin must be positioned for the Matrix deal and steal, with an extra feature of loading a "LOAD" coin under the first card at A. while also stealing away the quarter for Matrix.

Right hand and English penny omitted for clarity. Here is how to re-grip. Encircle the cards with the left second finger and thumb, around the long sides, from above. Still controlling the large coin with the right hand, slide around to the right narrow end. To load and pick-up simultaneously, move to above quarter A. Pick up quarter between second finger and thumb tips of left hand. Deal top card held by right narrow end, and load coin from below onto spot A as you move left hand cards and stolen quarter slightly to the left to make room for card and load coin on table. Next, move to over spot B. Deal the next card and deposit stolen quarter next to quarter at point B. Finally put last card over quarter at spot C., to end this phase. You have an English penny in each classic palm. An English penny is under card at spot A. Two quarters are under card at spot B., and a quarter is under the card at spot C. Phase two - The next part is fairly standard Matrix procedure with only the added difficulty of having a coin in each palm to keep concealed and the large one under the card at spot A. Put your left hand on card C., and your right hand at card B. Do the standard Al Schneider pick-up move at spot C., with your left, and just snap the card at spot B to reveal two coins. It looks as if the coin at C has jumped to join the one at B. Put the card and concealed quarter under the card in the right hand and lower these as a unit over the two quarters at B, avoiding coin-talk.

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Put your left hand, still palming its final load, on the card at spot A. Again put your right, still palming its final load, on the two cards at spot B. Do the pick-up move with your left, lifting card and hidden load coin, from spot A. The right hand lifts both cards as a unit at point B, to end this phase. Phase three - Put the left hand's card and concealed load coin under the two cards in the right hand, and use the left thumb and fingers to hold the three cards and load coin briefly while the right hand re-grips so that the right thumb is on top of cards and right fingers under cards and holding load coin by pressure up against the bottom of the cards. The right still has a load in right classic palm but concealed by Malini/Kaps et al Subtlety. The left hand also has a load classic palmed. Use the tip of the left first finger to steady one quarter as you use the cards in right hand to scoop one quarter up onto cards. Scooping towards yourself helps your angles. Next it will seem as if you dump the scooped quarter into your left hand. In reality the first switch-in takes place. The right thumb holds back the quarter and really the load coin on your right fingers' side of the cards drops into cupped left hand - its load (for later) still being concealed with classic palm and Malini/Kaps Subtlety. The left does a wrist turn and rubs coin on mat and lifts to reveal - the first English penny as a surprise!

The right hand has to now alter its grip.

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What the drawing above shows is how the right second finger has swung around the side of the cards to clip the quarter, which frees the right thumb. What happens next is that the side of the cards we see in the drawing and the quarter, are lowered to face-down. The far side of the cards in the drawing is now on top. Move the thumb around so that it is on top, too. The situation is quarter under cards, held by second finger. On top are the thumb and first finger. To end this adjustment, the right first finger can now move out and around cards to underneath. The thumb has stayed on top, and underneath, all fingers together now hold and screen quarter for when that side gets flashed during upcoming moves. We are now in position to use the cards in the right hand, and the quarter hidden underneath by the right fingers, to scoop another quarter up from the mat with a help from the left first finger which acts like a "stop" and keeps the quarter from sliding as it is scooped. The quarter will actually stay in place on the cards as you pretend to dump it into the left cupped hand. The quarter is held in place by the right thumb. The right hand is almost palm down now. As the left turns almost palm up, to "accept" the "quarter", its concealed English penny is screened by Kaps/Malini Subtlety. The left does a wrist turn to palm down on the way to the mat and lets the English penny fall to left fingertip rest. This coin is rubbed on the mat and the hand lifted to reveal surprise ending #2. Now a dodge which breaks the rhythm and gets us into position for the final load. The left hand picks up the final quarter, and rubs it on the mat and lifts to show the coin vanished. This is an application of a move I always credit to Paul Gertner. All that takes place is that on the way to the mat, the left hand classic palms the quarter before the

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rubbing action. After the vanish, the quarter "reappears" on the mat underneath the cards held by the still palm down right hand. All you have to do is release the quarter just held-back by the right thumb against the cards before the previous dumping to left hand (fake) action. Lift the cards, and turn the right hand palm up, to reveal the surprise reappearance of the quarter - actually a dupe. Scoop this quarter up exactly as before, and again pretend to dump to left hand, again pinning it to cards with right thumb. In this case, the English penny from right classic palm falls into the waiting left hand, which rubs it on the mat and lifts to reveal the final change. CLEANUP PHASE The still palm down right hand has the three cards held as a unit. On top, but hidden under the right fingers, is one quarter. Under the cards, held by the thumb, is another quarter, and in the left palm is the third. Put the cards in the left hand, almost in dealing position. The left fingers take over control of the quarter under the cards. Maintain contact with the right fingers on the quarter on top of the cards. Now, slide the top quarter off of the cards, moving away from yourself. As this quarter clears the cards, press it up against the right flat fingers with the right thumb, but in such a way, see upcoming drawing, that the tip of the thumb is free and the pad of thumb way back by the joint is what is pressing on the quarter. This is so that you can go directly to the first English penny, lift it and put it on the second, and then lift these and put on the third. Now put the fingers flat on the stack, loading the concealed quarter on top of the English pennies. Get your thumb under all. Turn your right hand palm up. The English pennies effectively hide the quarter.

Showing how quarter is held so tips of thumb and fingers can pick up and stack English pennies. Take the left hand cards and hidden coins to a left pocket and the right hand's coins to a right pocket. The jingling of the right coins masks any sound of coin talk from the left pocket. -FEENSee you in 6565 AD or CE.

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BOF Bonus Z – Beyond “BEST OF FEEN-X” by Gregg WEBB 2012 A TREATISE on HOBSON’S CHOICE for 5 objects. Why, you may ask, would we need a new re-hash on the magician’s force? First off, it is another thing that many magicians do badly, even though most will claim to know all about it...like an Elmsley Count or a Double Lift. Most magicians will say they know how to do them (“But of COURSE”) but actually most do these badly too. Back to the Equivoque, one reason for poor success with this, which can approach real magic when done well, is that most magicians don’t practice it enough, and don’t realize that it is something that takes practice. You have to be “ON TOP” of it to do it with the confidence it needs. Beyond this, though, is that they are unsure of the exact procedure to use. There is much misinformation out there. I base my information on informal instruction from the late great Charles Reynolds who beyond being Doug Henning’s consultant was also mentalist Marc Salem’s consultant (on MIND GAMES). First I plan to correct some common mistakes in procedure, then I have some new thoughts that seem to improve the whole thing, upon much testing and comparisons. One mistake commonly made is to ask at the beginning to have the spectator point to two items at once...right off the bat. This is a mistake which prevents you from having one of the “clean” endings. The correct approach here is to say “Point to an object with your left hand...” You make your voice sound like there may be more said. If she points to the target, you immediately add “...and pick it up.” If she doesn’t point to the target at first, you add immediately “...and one with your right hand.” (Here a hesitation is almost fatal...yet most magicians do hesitate which is why they conclude this isn’t strong and therefore don’t use it.) Now, if the target IS included in the two, say “...and pick them both up”. OK. Now, if the target wasn’t included in the 2 pointed at, don’t have them picked up of course, but instead we introduce the idea of a “discard pile” and “the process of elimination”. To digress, the late and great Charles Reynolds always told me to never mention “discard pile” or “process of elimination” but after years of meditation I now think he was only partially right. True, don’t mention those words before the trick, and not even up through the first 2 choices! If they “HIT” on the first point – a miracle! Even up to the point of them pointing at 2 if need be, don’t use those words...but after 2 have been chosen I believe it helps the clarity to take the two coins yourself and drop them into a designated “discard pile” and call it that!

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To further clarify...if the target is included in the 2 – Don’t use the words DISCARD or ELIMINATE. Only if the first 2 don’t include the target do you switch to the idea of “discard pile” and “process of elimination”. *Gregg WEBB addition to procedure: The only thing I’ve added personally to all this is to designate a special place for the “discard pile” and you’ll see the reason soon. So, when they hit on the second pointing, and you have them “PICK THEM UP”, you then push the rest to our special place, which is nearer the spectator and to her right! If the target is not included in the first 2 choices don’t even have her pick them up. You pick them up and put them in the “discard pile spot” yourself and here you can actually use the words “into the discard pile” and also begin talking about “the process of elimination”. The next common mistakes are; to have only 1 of the remainder pointed to as at the beginning. Or “pointed to at all”. No. Here you can go for 2, one right after the other, and “PICKED UP” not “pointed to”. So it would be “Next, pick up one with your left hand and one with your right hand.” We don’t want to use “point to" again. If both “picked up” here MISS...HAVE THE SPECTATOR HERSELF DROP THE 2 into the “discard pile”. You, meanwhile, pick up the final remaining object yourself in preparation for “selling” the miracle. This is as strong as if they point to the target on the first try. (here the target is left for last.)(by the “process of elimination”.) WE’VE YET TO COVER 2 EVENTUALITIES; when the target is included in the first 2, and when the target is included in the second two. HERE WE GO: When included in the first 2, and you’ve pushed the other 3 to the discard zone, and the spectator has picked up those 2, you say “HAND ME ONE”. If she gives you the target, raise it high and ask her to drop hers in the discard pile which by placing it near her and to her right, makes it easy for her to do that. This way you don’t have to take it from her and drop it in the discard pile yourself (seeming fairer). Also...we can eliminate the “DO YOU WANT TO CHANGE YOUR MIND?” ploy often used. It confuses rather than clarifies, now that we have that new discard zone near her and to her right making it easy for her to find, so you don’t have to. Just build to the climax from here. The idea of raising the target you hold higher than everything else is Max Maven’s HIGH ROAD principle. If she hands you the non-target item...you ask her to raise hers high and you drop yours into the discard pile. Go from there. *If the target is included in the second 2 items chosen; you put the remainder (the 5th item) into the discard pile. Now ask her to hand you one.

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If she has the target, have her raise it...you drop yours in the discard zone. Build from there. *** If she hands you the target, hold it high! Ask her to drop hers (herself) into the discard pile. Dispense with the “DO YOU WANT TO CHANGE YOUR MIND” ploy so commonly used. The way we are now working this, it doesn’t make it all clearer...it “muddies” the procedure. Well – have fun! Gregg WEBB 2012

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Beyond Geller-Coins By Gregg Webb Oh boy! Oh boy! Anyway, I can take this opportunity to tell you that Uri Geller’s son is now making news in Europe somewhere for his own spoon bending (!) I heard it on Channel 5 news. But this is about bending coins with the power of mind. I really like this! It uses Scotch & Soda which is a prop most magicians have I hope. If not – get one! This use is great and unique. You’ll also need a bent, slightly curved, English penny. Also, for the deluxe version you also need a bent regular half-dollar. To bend, I put the lower half in a vise protected with leather or rubber (pieces of an old belt work fine). Tighten the vise, then hit the upper part sideways with a rubber mallet! Not too much. Get-Ready: Use your bang-ring to separate your Scotch & Soda and classic palm the slightly bent English penny (regular English penny but bent) [Do not bend the gaff/insert with the English penny shim on one side – half-dollar on other](!)…in your right classic palm, and palm the slightly bent half-dollar in the left classic palm.

Perform: Put the Scotch & Soda “coins” on the table and move them around a little to give your hands something to do. If no table, pass them back and forth between your hands to keep hands busy. Finally take both with your right hand ready to nest. Press them together as you ask spectator to name copper or silver. Whatever the answer you use equivoque to “arrive” at copper. Whatever is said you interpret it to be the copper that will bend. Act out some dark forces coursing thru your hand then dump out the coins and the copper one is seen bent.

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The other is the nested Scotch & Soda set as a unit. Now for the Deluxe ending, which isn’t hard, take the Scotch & Soda nested set (the Half Dollar) and fingerpalm it in the right hand as you pretend to put it into your left hand, which must necktie somewhat since it holds a semi-bent real half dollar … or if you time this shuttle right it can look as if the left hand turns palm up under the shade of the right hand. And then the left hand closes before the audience can see the bend in the coin (which is why the slight bend only). Then the right hand picks up the bent copper at the fingertips to give the right hand something to do(!) Finally act out the left hand coin bending by psychic powers and dump the left hand’s bent half dollar on table or in her hand. There it is. Have fun. Gregg Webb Bayside, 2012

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Another BOF Bonus - Beyon “Best Of Feen-X” by Gregg Webb This began way back in the Phoenix and I “changed” it 2 times…trying for easier and more magical. Finally I “dreamt up,” literally, a third version beyond the original. RUBBER BANDS MIRACLE III or you could even say IV. Note that this is a card trick…it sounds like a rubber band trick…it is not. The “changes” in this one are that it is even easier and the backs of the 2 packets are different. 1 Red - 1 Blue! Required & Setup: You need 20 red-spot cards - no face cards (royal cards) with blue backs and 20 black spot cards with red backs. Plus 2 rubber bands. Take 1 Red spot with Blue Back and put at face or the pile of Black spots with Red backs. Put rubber band around. Also do the opposite - take 1 black spot out of Red Backed group and put at face of red spots group with Blue Backs and put rubber band around. So…in each group, the face card has a different color from the rest, and a different back from the rest…and vice versa. PERFORMANCE: The rubber bands also serve a presentational angle other than just holding a packet secure. To perform have either packet picked…it doesn’t matter. First off a simple false shuffle. With the face down packet held for a hindu shuffle, pull a group from the middle and hindu shuffle off. This leaves the face card unaffected. Also very important - don’t let any faces show yet in this phase. In other words…stay low. Next…begin a hindu shuffle with the WHOLE PACKET…but this will be a HINDU FORCE. Have someone say “STOP,” and do so, and flash (force) the face card of the right hand remainder. After they see it, drop the right hand group on the left hand group…centering the od colored force card in the group! ***

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Put the rubber band around the packet! OK! Next…repeat all of the above with a different spectator, with the other packet. All that remains is to make the magic happen. Say “What I will try to accomplish is to make all the red cards jump to the blue pile except your selection (as you point to the volunteer). AND I will also try to get all the black cards jump to the red pile except your card (point to the other volunteer). Do your best passes or magical gestures or use magic words or woofle dust - but do it and spread both packets first face down and then face up to show only the 1 opposing color - face and back in each group. If you have a proper cloth surface do a Ribbon Spread Turnover of each packet. First do face down - let them see the 1 back of a different color in each spread - then do the Ribbon Turnovers to show the faces - all the one color with a different color in the middle - THE SELECTIONS!! ENJOY - try it on laymen! (Not for Magicians) Gregg Webb 2012

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BOF BONUS

RED HOT FLUGELHEIMER By Gregg Webb This effect is a very clever variation of “Red Hot Mama” also known as “Chicago Opener”. There are some prominent magicians connected with this trick’s origin such as Frank Everhart, Jim Ryan, Ed Marlo and Al Leech, who created “A Hot Card Trick”. [I want to thank Phil Willmarth for his assistance with the history and credits for this very popular theme. I’ve heard it said in the underground that Phil Willmarth is the man to seek for any kind of magic history and credits! His extensive library is second to none! Phil Willmarth, who wrote up four booklets of the magic of Jim Ryan, told me that the above-mentioned trick was created by Al Leech. Jim Ryan came up with the “Red Hot Mama” theme and scads of others came up with a myriad of variations.] Gregg’s trick is a “one card” version…with a signature! NEEDED: You will require a Sharpie, a red-backed card (preferably the Queen of Hearts!) and a blue-backed deck. SET-UP: Have the red-back Queen of Hearts (QH) at the face of the blue-back deck. PERFORMANCE: Begin by handing the Sharpie to a spectator and say, “For some reason this trick only works with blue-backed decks!” The selection will be made by forcing the QH! To wit: Hold the deck in Hindu Shuffle position and ask the spectator to say “Stop!” as you shuffle off small packets of cards from the top of the deck into your left hand . When she stops you, hold your right hand palm out toward the spectator and have her sign or initial the face of the (blue-backed!) Queen of Hearts while you hold the packet. The performer should not “see” the face of this card! After she signs the face of the QH, lower this right-hand packet onto the left-hand packet as if to ‘drop off’ the signed card onto the left-hand packet. In actuality you will drop off 2, 3 or 4 cards. Doug Edwards advised that dropping off a “block” of cards instead of just 2 cards will make this “dodge” smoother and more convincing. (Note: After dropping off the block of cards onto the left-hand packet, you might wish to casually “flash” the bottom card of the right-hand packet to further imply that the signed selection is actually on top of the left-hand packet.)

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Move the right-hand cards away a bit, and as an after-thought say, “See…the card has a blue-back…but that’s going to change!” Drop the right-hand packet on top of the left-hand packet, do your magic, then spread the deck to reveal a lone red-backed card amongst a blue-backed deck! Turn the blue-backed card over to reveal the signed selection!

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BOF BONUS ZZZ (Triple Z! Beyond Best of)

ACE, 2, 3 REDUX Vernon’s great trick…revisited! by Gregg Webb There are several versions of this effect in The Vernon Chronicles by Stephen Minch, but these aren’t his best versions…NO! The best one was published in The Phoenix by Bruce Elliot. I used to perform this effect a lot in the 1960’s and 1970’s but I stopped using it because something bothered me…well several things. NOW…50 years later, I finally solved the “thing” that bothered me…and Doug Edwards solved a few other “particulars” in handling…and here we go! Gregg has circumvented one of the sleights that Vernon used to control the selection to the top of the deck – the side slip (side steal) – and replaced it with a simple swing (swivel) cut to keep the Ace, 2 and 3 on top of the deck. He also added another phase which, I feel has a very nice touch and is congruous with the theme. PERFORM: Remove the Ace, 2 and 3 of Spades, have deck shuffled. Re-insert the Ace, 2 and 3 of Spades back into the deck and multiple shift them back to the top of the facedown deck, in order! I use the D’Amico Shift, but any multiple shift will do fine. Have a card selected saying, “Make sure you don’t get the Ace, two or three of Spades!” After the selection is made, swivel or swing cut* the top half of deck into your left hand. Offer your left hand for return of the selection and then either place or dribble the right hand cards on top, being sure to keep a left pinkie break. Double undercut to the break and now, from the top down, should be the selection, the Ace, 2 and 3 of Spades…the 3S being fourth from the top of the deck. *Instead of the double undercut…you may opt to perform a Classic or Jiggle Pass, bringing the 4 card stock to the top of the deck. Phase I: The Ace, 2 and 3 of Spades, jump to the top! Announce, “I will now make the Ace, 2 and 3 of Spades, jump to the top of the deck!”

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Have someone ‘tap’ the deck and then spread the cards slightly as you procure a left pinkie break under the top two cards (selection and Ace) and then square the deck up. Perform a double lift by lifting the double (as one card) with your right hand, in Biddle grip. The right hand turns palm up to display the Ace of Spades! Apparently, the Ace of Spades has jumped to the top of the deck, (the selection is secretly above it)! Pick up the next card (2S) with your palm down right hand and stepped to your left, beneath the double. Finally pick up the 3 of Spades stepped to the left of the 2 and Ace. Turn your right hand palm up to show the fan of three cards…the 3S will be at the face. Replace the fan of cards back on top of the deck as you retain a left pinkie break under the top four (supposedly three!) cards. Phase II: This phase is Vernon’s actual Ace, 2, 3 Trick! What this phase entails, is that the performer claims he will change any of the three cards, the Ace the two or the three, into the spectator’s selection! As the performer explains that he will make the “…Ace, 2 or 3 change into the selection…” spread the cards as you say the above patter and get a left pinkie break under the 3, which is the fourth card from the top! There are (obviously) three “outs” depending if the spectator wants the Ace, the two or the three to change into the selection! Place the top three cards, only, onto the table in a row. Gregg reminds us to place the cards into a row that will be seen from the spectator’s point of view. In other words, place the three cards in a row from your right, to your left! (See pic below) On the performer’s right will be the selection (S), in the middle is the Ace (supposedly the 2!) and on the right is the 2 of Spades, supposedly the 3!

Below are the three possible scenarios 1) If the spectator asks for the Ace to change:

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Have the spectator place her finger onto the tabled card on your far right, which is supposedly the Ace (actually the selection!) For this 1st scenario you may release your left pinkie break under the 3 on top of the deck. Next pick up the middle card (Ace) and place it on top of the 3rd card (2S) and then pick up both cards and lay them on top of the deck, retaining a left pinkie break. Double lift the top two cards in Biddle grip and turn your palm up to show a 2. Then pick up 3, stepped to side and display the 2 and the 3 in a small fan! Replace the minifan back on top of the deck as you say “See?! The 2 and the 3 haven’t changed!” Turn the tabled card over to show selection! 2) If the spectator asks for the “two” to change: In Bruce Elliot’s version in Phoenix, a Mexican Turnover is used. Gregg reminds us that this can be a tough move depending on conditions such as a bad surface. Instead Gregg opts to use a suggestion by Doug Edwards. (Doug also suggested the breaks used in preparation for the double turnovers.) When the spectator indicates the middle card (supposedly the 2S), the performer then picks up the 3rd card on his left (the supposed 3S) and places it on top of the deck. You now have a break under 2 cards. Turn this double, face up on top of the deck to display the 3S. Say, “The three hasn’t changed!” Keep the double, face up, on top of the deck, retaining the pinkie break. This next sequence requires the performer to be able to handle one of the tabled cards with the deck in hand and the break retained…this should be fairly easy to do. Both hands move to pick up the two tabled cards…the left hand (with deck) picks up the “middle card” (the actual Ace of Spades) and right hand picks up the right-most card (selection) but with the faces of the cards toward your body so that no one can see these two cards except you! Place both cards together momentarily and quickly switch them as you then flick the sides of the two cards together a couple of times! This is very easy to do and will go without suspicion! The spectators STILL only see the backs of the two cards, but now the Ace is in your right hand and the selection is in your left hand which still holds the deck with the 3S (a double!) showing on top. Place these two cards back onto the table, however the Ace of Spades in your right hand is laid onto the table, face up, for all to see. Simultaneously, the left-hand card (selection) is laid face down to the left of the face-up Ace! (See pic)

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and the other two cards on table with Ace, face up. Build up the revelation and reveal the selection at the #2 position! 3) If the spectator asks for the “three” to change: Lose the pinkie break under the 3S. Set the deck down…you don’t need it. Scoop up the three cards and “necktie” them so only you can see them. Place the Ace, face up on the table to your right and then place the 2 just to the left of the Ace, also face up. Finally place the selection, face down, to the left of all.

Proceed to build up this final revelation for the climax! Note: Gregg feels the versions of Ace-2-3 in the Vernon Chronicles (Minch Hermetic Press) are not as strong as the version found in the Phoenix with his beginning and Doug Edwards streamlining!

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METALISM III by Gregg Webb Edited by Doug MacGeorge I learned something about spoon bending from the Amazing Randi in the early ’70s. I simplified it into METALISM 1 for my own use and I shared it with Geof Latta. The simplification was based on having the “prepared” spoon completely broken through but pinched together at the “join” by the left thumb and first fingertip. The right hand held a “control” or unprepared spoon. In Randi’s version, the “prepared” spoon was “stressed” (bent back and forth until just ready to break). Further, a FLUSTRATION COUNT of sorts was used. If both spoons began in the left hand, the “control” spoon could be taken with the right hand, shown, and banged on the table, then replaced in the left hand. After a pause, the same unprepared spoon would be taken again as if the other spoon is being taken. This is what makes it like the Flustration Count. This one (same one really) is banged on the table. This one is then set aside as the “control” to compare after the bending and breaking (melting—implied by acting) took place. In my METALISM 1 all I changed was to have to spoon to break (melt? Etc.) be already totally broken through and just pinched by the left hand to make it look solid. In my METALISM II, I added the feature of the “control” spoon seeming to bend—then return to normal—by the use of the “rubber pencil” illusion, with the right hand. The patter was, “If I think ‘melt—melt—melt,’ the spoon gets warm and starts to get ‘bendy’—but if I stop and let it cool…it returns to normal.” Then the control spoon was set down. Next the left hand would act out the getting droopy—imitating the “look” of the rubber pencil illusion by moving the left hand up and down and relaxing the pressure of the pinch at the join. Finally the two parts really drooped and one part and then the other would fall, seemingly melting all the way through. I’d say, “Don’t touch it…it gets hot!” Finally, the change of METALISM III is to have the control spoon bent slightly…to make it not seem “too perfect.” In fact…it is best to have it bent twice, as if bent, and then when you straighten it out. You actually make a second bend the other direction and about 3/8” away from the first.

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The DOUBLE BEND or “wrinkle” is hidden at all times by the right fingers, even in the rubber-pencil style illusion, and until the “control” is set down. Here it is seen to have been altered some, instead of too pristine. To end I’d like to include a little history. There was a good spoon trick in Stars of Magic (the NEW Stars of Magic) by Fred Baumann which needed a slightly altered spoon plus an extra handle. At the end, after breaking the spoon supposedly, the spoon was restored. You had to palm or lap or sleeve the extra handle. I never liked being in that position plus I couldn’t see restoring a broken spoon. Then there was another version with an altered (bent) spoon and extra handle. This one had to be done at about eye level and was different from the Fred Baumann version. This one also was very good…but you again had to lap or palm or sleeve the extra handle piece. Mine, especially METALISM III, has solved this in what I feel is the best solution. —FIN—

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BEYOND “BEST OF”

BOF BONUS X Revisiting cups and balls. I have been working on the cups again, meaning “changes” to the routine that ran in GENII a while ago. Also, I devised a new routine, much shorter and will run that too. First, oh no, some comments; the Vernon routine is not the Ultimate, but very good. One big problem … the exposure of the pinkie curl – palm of a small ball as misdirection for a large load. Terrible! The other is that the wand spin – good as a flourish – is not good for the vanish of a small ball because it flashes when everyone but Vernon and Louis McCord did it! (The inventor – “Silent Mora”) Think of this … you could just as easily do a fake “PUT” into the left hand … really keeping ball in the right pinkie curl-palm … then do the Johnny Brown or “DRUMMER’s” WAND SPIN [the one that goes around the thumb like computer geeks do with Bic pens. Then show the left hand empty. Many guys seem to feel obligated to do the “wand spin vanish” yet flash when they do so. On this topic, I have been experimenting with skipping the wand at all! What supposedly substitutes for the wand in the hand (either from between bicep and body or from just laying on the table.) is to place a cup from the left hand (which just lifted said cup to reveal a ball) either with the mouth of cup going into right hand to be re-loaded or, conversely, the top (narrow end) can be placed in the right (palming hand) as if like a wand … in other words, to give the palming hand something to hold, … something to do! Instead of a wand. Next, when the right had is needed for some sleight or other, such as receiving in a shuttle-pass or utility move or such, the cup is placed on its side on the table with the mouth towards the viewers. Anyway – I’ve re-blocked my whole routine so as to use the above technique (putting a cup into hand-palming hand – instead of a wand) so as to eliminate the wand from the routine. *** OK! And did I mention that these are the changes I’ve put into my routine since it ran in Genii? Well, next I eliminated the “putting the cups on their sides” thing from Michael Ammar or whoever started that. When they are loaded. Now, when a cup is loaded, I just put in on the table the old-fashioned way, just normally vertical with the large load inside. So … with those changes, I am sticking mainly with my old routine as written in Genii.

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*** New Routine: I wanted to try a real short routine. What you will read is original, but my research yielding the news that Scotty York had something similar, and Jay Sankey, AND Tommy Wonder, too, referring to spongeball loads. In my routine I only need 2 spongeball loads + a real ball for the 3rd. And I only need 1 small ball.

Here is why the 2 sponge balls. Perform: With the small ball on table in view, the stack is held in left hand necktied so they can’t look into the top cup and see the real ball. Drawing off the bottom and turning the lower cup mouth down and placing on table in your “soft-touch-gallop,” 1, 2, and 3 cups are “placed” on table.

3 supposed “vanishes” with reappearances under cups – keeping loads hidden throughout: Take the small ball with right hand and pretend to put into left hand which acts now like it holds something. Really palm the ball in Right Pinkie Curl palm. Act out your vanish, then reach to cup 3 and rock it forward and use the tip of the right ring finger to sneak under the cup and support the load ball or sponge ball. OK! Drop the small ball as you lift the cup and load, revealing small ball. *** Now just repeat this vanish and reappearance two more times (with the 2 other cups) … implying the cups are empty, and fulfills the required sequence with small ball in an intentionally minimalistic way.

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Now reveal the loads and remember Tommy Wonder’s advice that if you act as if the sponge balls are just regular balls, not sponges, audience will too. -ciao-

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BOF BONUS Z

BEYOND “BEST OF” by Gregg Webb Hello, again! : Since we are discussing CUPS & BALLS I thought I’d add an idea submitted by Doug Edwards. One reason I decided to run it is that someone had just explained the concept to me (on the phone) just before Doug called! But what is telling, is that the person-in-question didn’t remember whose idea it was!! This happens a lot. So… let’s begin Doug’s ending. Imagine you’re getting near the end of the small balls section of your routine… re-block things so that when you have 3 on the table and one ball still under a cup.

* The idea is; stack the cups so they make a unit… sort of like CHOP CUP. And … we’ll handle the unit (of 3 stacked cups) that way… as if they were 1 thing… a chop cup! WOW! So what this does is give us a different handling entirely for a CUPS & BALLS ending. ** Next; take the three balls (in view) as a group… to your pocket. Say, “1 COMES HOME” as your right hand makes a gesture over the stack of cups. Simultaneously, the left hand still in pocket grasps a load ball or fruit (we seem to be favoring limes these days) and begin bringing it out (hidden) from pocket. I mean “palmed”. This is like finger palming or Cardini cradle palm with a large ball. *** So lift the stack of cups as a unit- revealing the (actually 4th) small ball that was still under stack. Also, load the cup by placing cup over load in left hand… then hold cup & load with left hand. As right hand now lifts the small ball from to show it and you’ll comment on it, you put cup & hidden load on table.

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**** Next, put the small ball into your left hand which in turn puts it into a left pocket… (NOTE: Some use the left rear pocket for loads these days) I use left front pocket for loads if I have a jacket on. (Sports jacket with sleeves pushed up.)… And now grip the 2nd load. NOTE: Only 2 loads will be produced… again, Chop Cup thinking. ***** Right Hand lifts cup to reveal the 1st load as you say “BUT WHERE DID THIS COME FROM” or some such, and take the opportunity to put cup into left hand over load #2. Now as you pick up the 1st load, with right hand, set loaded cup on table with left hand. Set load #1 on table with left hand. After a pause reveal Load #2. “And this one really blows my mind”, or something, can be said to end. Each load is revealed by lifting stack of 3 as a unit. I like it! Gregg Webb corollary: If you were following my other writings about cups-and balls, you’ll see how this gives me an alternate ending. *I have a load in the cups from the start… plus I only use 3 small balls - no extra balls… So - I’m way ahead. To use the Doug Edwards idea, I’d pretend to put all 3 small balls into my left hand, but really hold 1 back in right PINKIE CURLPALM. As my left hand puts it’s 2, supposedly 3 small ones in a left pocket… my right hand would be doing the move I’m fooling everyone with – as I pick up the right cup which has been loaded from the start… I use the tip of right ring finger to get under there ( a slight rock forward does the trickallowing tip of right finger to get under the cup and support load ball – or lime)- and as cup & load are lifted, the right pinkie drops its small ball!!! Set loaded cup down and now stack the other 2 Cups on the loaded cup- a stack of 3. Say “one has come back” referring to the small ball. Put ball into left hand and this pocket… and now is when the left hand grasps what will be the 2nd load from pocket and begins to emerge from pocket. Right hand has by now, as you say “But I’ll never understand where this came from”, lifted the entire stack of 3 as 1 unit to reveal the 1st load! Right hand places entire stack as a unit on the left hand over 2nd load. As you comment on, and right hand picks up, 1st load- left hand sets down the stack of cups & hidden load. Finally produce 2nd load by lifting stack as a unit! *** And, if really not dressed for hiding the 2nd Load… I can end with just the one load ball in there from the beginning. Lifting stack as a unit!!

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YAY!!!

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BOFFO BONUS! by Gregg WEBB 2011 I once (or twice) ran a version of the Nate Leipzig's trick where he "second deal-ed" 5 selections to his (dealer's) hand! Mine were called something like "NATE LEIPZIG – WHAT A GUY!" and something else. I was trying to eliminate things of difficulty. Here I go again! 'NATE LEIPZIG POKER WITH NO "SECONDS", PUNCH DEAL, SHORT CARDS, ETC.' by Gregg WEBB 2011 Effect: Same as above. METHOD OVERVIEW: What I am doing on this version… my favorite to date… is using a ploy of my own invention whereby we imply a "THOUGHT OF " idea… in fact… the real title should be 2011 * PSYCHIC CARDSHARK * 2011 The patter is to the effect that… "What if a great card handler (card cheat) were also psychic?!!" This routine needs at least 4 spectators – hopefully more. You will require 4 or even 5 participants. You can play the 5th part, instead. How this works is that you false shuffle a stacked deck. On top of this stacked deck are 5 hands of poker of 5 cards each… making 25 cards. The rest of the deck is random… 27 "unstacked" cards which may help you decide on which FALSE SHUFFLE to use. You will thumb off five cards in a fan into your right hand. You will shove this fan in the face of your first victim with the command "MEMORIZE THE HIGHEST CARD IN THE HAND!" They do so, and you square and drop on the table this hand. The secret is that the cards… All hands… have the highest card at the FACE of the fan. (NOTE: Don't have aces involved at all. Too confusing since they can be high or low – 1 or 11 or 13 depending on the game. For the same reason… don't have more than 1 face card (royal card) in a hand… in case someone only knows games where all face cards are 10. So… proceed to the thumb off 5 more – hold the 5 card fan in the next "volunteer's" face and get her or him to memorize the "HIGHEST CARD" in the hand. Square and drop on table on top of the first!! * You are hereby stacking the face down hands. The face card, – the one "highest" in value, is, when the hand is turned face down, at the 5th position down, stacked to fall to the 5th (dealers) hand… that's you.

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So… you'd continue this procedure with the rest of the five hands, and drop each on the pile on the table you are making, face down, then put this stack on top of the remainder of deck (talon). FALSE SHUFFLE – this is important. Deal out 5 hands while they "CONCENTRATE" ON THEIR CARD (highest card in each hand). You'll get the 5 "selections" or mental selections (!) or the cards you are all just thinking of into your hand, (5th hand) when you deal 5 Rounds. PERFORMANCE DETAILS: I got one of those discs that say "DEALER" which I put by MY hand, the 5th hand. For clarity. So there you have it. A new way to do Leipzig's poker trick without the key numbers and second – dealing. Regards, Gregg Webb 2011

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This is one of the most clever things I’ve come across. “Why Ask”? By Gregg Webb, Et al, J. K. Hartman etc., J. C. Wagner This is too good to wait! If anyone can think of a different handling on the force and replacement… but the rest of the structure AND the premise AND the J. K. Hartman thing with the JOKER, WOW! On Cerberic Routines Cerberic Routines, a term coined by T. A. Waters – or at least used by him, refers to three-way predictions, of which there are many. I’m sure you know a version. Mental Epic comes to mind. The three-billets in glass is another. Bob Cassidy’s envelopes is another. Often 2 of the predictions are free and 1 is a force. Trouble is, most routines I’ve seen lately ask us to ask the spectator what they thought of just after we make a prediction, supposedly. I always felt that this was unbelievable – as in not believable. Why have to ask? So I asked the Hound of Hell with the 3 heads, Cerberus, after whom this was named, to put his three heads together and solve this. Most recently I saw 2 of these routines in 1 Genii magazine. One was by J. C. Wagner and the other by Jim Steinmeyer. Both asked us to ask our volunteers what they thought of just after making our supposed prediction. I thought “Am I the only one who thinks this stinks or am I nuts?” I’ve even seen one like this last year by Max Maven.

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Max can probably pull this off with acting and conviction and showmanship, but I can’t. (I am more or less a technician about routines, and just want to tinker on this). Max says you have to act pleased that your prediction was correct, when you hear their choice. (For you all out there with acting ability.) So what I came up with is a variation of the J. C. Wagner one, with the nice Joker idea! I found that I could do a FORCE where his didn’t need one, and a control where his didn’t need one, an arrive at the SAME effect without having to ASK what they just thought of. WHY ASK? By Gregg Webb Containing a Nifty thing with the Joker by J. C. Wagner Required: 2 spectators, a deck with 2 matching jokers. Perform: As you look for the jokers with the deck necktied, get one to the face of the deck, (cut it there), and note the next card to the left when the deck is face down, (that known card is second from bottom.) When you get to the other Joker, put it face down on table and call it a “PREDICTION.” Pick a spectator to help. You are going to force that card you know, 2nd from bottom. Pull down the lowest card, the Joker, with left pinkie and pull out the entire lower half of the deck except the Joker, Hindu Style. Do a “Hindu Force” on the spectator, of the card that was second from bottom (Let’s say it was the 2 of Hearts). After the spectator sees their (force) card (2 of Hearts), droop right hand group on deck with no Break. Clean. Say you’ll look for another prediction, and run through necktied deck secretly looking for the card you forced, the 2 of Hearts. Put this on table next to the 1st prediction with room between them for a third card.

This next procedure is not a force but a control. It will look like the Hindu Force, but is fair. A control will follow. So, pull out any group from the middle and Hindu of till a 2nd spectator says “Stop” and he looks at the bottom of right hand’s group. This time the right hand doesn’t drop the group on the deck. Instead, pull down the lowest card of deck with left pinkie and insert right hand’s group below deck but above the pulled-down Joker. Square. Now, get a break above the lowest 2 cards of deck.. Thumb count, pinkie pull down, double-buckle, or combinations, then double undercut these to top of deck. (A reverse

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Double Undercuts) (Swing Cut top half of deck to left hand [Deck in right Biddle grip]. Etc. Etc. until Joker and the 2nd card looked at [(by spectator 2)] ARE ON TOP!) *** Now say “I am going to choose a card” [get ready for a Double Turnover]. “and I want you (either or both spectators) to tell (to guess) What my card is.” (Indicate top card) Get at least 1 to name any card, then turn over your double to show a Joker. Say, “It is a joker and Jokers are wild, so they can be anything! So, this is the J. C. Wagner part I really liked … and was inspired to fix the beginning part! Turn the double down and deal the real top card to between the 2 cards. This will be the card looked at “Hindu fashion” by 2nd spectator. Let’s say it is the 10 of Spades. The situation is:

The audience thinks the card on the left is a prediction of the card looked at by spectator 1 (after the prediction). They think the center card if the Joker they saw. Really it is the card looked at by spectator 2. On our right is the card looked at by spectator 1. They think it is the prediction for spectator 2. The change of the cards order is accomplished by, apparently turning the Joker face up as if to clarify the effect. Say, “Oh, let me turn the Joker face up”, as you finish picking up the cards in this manner. * Take the card from the left (our left) and place on left hand. Then the center card, but with a break in … and temporarily face down, then the card on the right (our right). You now have a break under 2 cards. * Pick up the 2 above the break and 1 and move it to bottom of packet! The Dirty work is done. * Turn Joker (top card) Face up! Now move the lowest single card to the top. Now all cards are as they should be! Reveal with Showmanship! --The END – I really feel the above is a break through! ***

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I already do many tricks which require 2 MATCHING JOKERS. For those of you new to this kind of trick … follow along … Get 2 decks (matching) when you buy. Take one joker out of one deck and one Joker … that matches … out of the other. (Most decks have 2 jokers … but they don’t match. One big, one small, etc. One plain, one with Disclaimer, … etc.) Then take the other Jokers out of both decks. Put 2 matching Jokers in one deck and the other 2 matching Jokers in the other deck. Say turned for my trick time traveler which will be the first trick in my new newsletter after 24th issue.

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BOF BONUS – Equivoque by Greg Webb 2012 I recently saw some name magicians struggle with this – the one with 5 objects.

Have spectator “point to one slip (card, coin, etc.) with your right hand…” If they pick the target you’re golden. Build it up as a miracle. If they point to any other slip, keep going as if you never stopped, with “… and one with your left hand.” If target is included, you place all the remainders into a “discard pile a little to the left, your left, and slightly nearer the volunteer. This means the “discard pile is to the spectator’s right and slightly closer to her than you. Now say “HAND ME ONE OF THOSE” and point to the 2 that the spectator is pointing to. If they hand you the target… raise it, a Max Maven idea (the high road) and you, the wizard, place the other into the discard pile, with your other hand. Build it up. If the target is not picked after 2 are pointed to; you yourself put those 2 into the discard pile in the same place… to the spectator’s right and closer to her than yourself. Say, “NOW, PICK UP ONE WITH YOUR LEFT HAND AND ONE WITH YOUR RIGHT HAND”. Notice you have to do 2 this time (2 at once almost) because you had to do 2 last procedure) [In other words, you can’t go back to 1 as in “PICK UP ONE.” No. Because you had to go to 2 on the first procedure, you have to do 2 this time. Trust me. OK. Now, if the target is not picked… you have a miracle – build it up! The target being the only one not eliminated is almost as strong as the first eventuality. You would say, “AND DROP THOSE INTO THE DISCARD PILE” as you point to the discard pile. This is why you formed the discard pile nearer the spectator than yourself! It makes it easy to do this for the spectator. If the target is included in the 2 picked up, you place the remaining 1 into the discard pile yourself. Then say “HAND ME ONE OF THOSE” and if they give you the target, hold it high and ask that they drop the other in the discard pile. Build up your ending “YOU GAVE ME THIS ONE.” (The holding it high gives credence to acting like this means you chose this one.)

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And finally, the other possibility is that they hold onto the target and give you the other. You drop it immediately onto the discard pile and ask her to hold it (the target) high so everyone can see it! Build up the ending. “You chose this by elimination etc.” *** Note that I eliminated the “DO YOU WANT TO CHANGE YOUR MIND” ploy often taught in favor of the clarity you get by putting the discard pile nearer the spectator so they can do the “dropping into the discard pile” when appropriate. -fin-

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BOF BONUS 3 2012 As you know, I’ve been playing with color backs ideas. Also playing with Himber Wallet ideas. Another theme has been “The ALL NIGHT Card” and other ways to get a signature. One falls into a category I think of as STARGATE GW 4. STARGATE G.W. 4 – 2012 With COLOR BACK changes and SIGNATURE! This is related to the ALL-NITE Card plus other ways to get a FORGED SIGNATURE or in the other case, an EXTRA SIGNATURE. One way I’ll discuss was how Jack Chanin used to work it. He would save signed cards … then file them away for the future. That’s right! All it takes is to remember to not give a card, signed and used in a trick, back to the spectator to keep as a souvenir of the event … which is by-the-way, how it has usually been handled. No … just keep it … in the deck … at various times during the night you can “weed out” the deck of signed cards so they don’t interfere with other tricks on other people. (Remember, most card tricks except for a few math tricks don’t need exactly 52 cards or 54 with Jokers.) In any case, file and keep the signed cards. Remember … let’s say the President of the Rotary Club is the one that signed your check has left their signature on the check!!! Or maybe it was the treasurer! Find out and meet who signed your check! Make a Xerox of the signature for your files! Next holidays season or whatever the reason for the event … you want to know if that person is still in the club … will be at the event. So … for this method … you’d forge, or trace with a lightbox the xeroxed signature onto a card … or do what i do … actually forge it face up but upside down and backwards. This is the method of real cons because your own “hand”, or way of making letters, won’t enter into the signature forgery. In other words, you are copying curves … not letters when you use this method. So, let’s say you use this method … you’d forge it onto a card before a show. Remember what card you forge on! You’ll have to force that card … one without a signature yet, during the show … if you use this method. Now, the method I use, wait until the show itself. During the show do some trick with signature needed on card … when done with the trick … Keep the card in deck. Later, at some point, go to the bathroom, or out for a break (go to your car) and here is when you forge the signature on a dupe card from another card. One of these will end up in an impossible location. Lately I’ve been considering the Himber wallet for that location. Also … it would be an envelope into the wallet not just a card in the wallet. (This way you fake out the envelope (#6 coin envelope or such) and put the wallet away. This way it seems about the envelope, not the wallet(!). The whole Routine:

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Set-up: Put an empty envelope in one side of the Himber wallet. In the other side, put an envelope with the card from early in the evening with the real signature. OK. NEXT: Required for stargate vanish. Let’s assume the deck is Blue Backed. Fine. Also needed is a Blue Backed Joker and 3 Red Backed Jokers. Follow me on this!!! On the BLUE BACKED DECK … Put on top the Dupe selection with the Fake (forged) signature and then on top of all put the Blue Backed Joker!!! Stay with me folks. The 3 red backed Jokers should be kept in a separate pocket. PERFORM: You go up to the person that signed the card (you did a trick for them earlier). Now, please note that this should probably be the last trick of the night! Say, “I want to show you one last thing … a miracle.” Here comes the all night card principle. Don’t have a new card selected. Say “I have your card that you signed right here. Do a double turnover and show briefly the dupe with Fake&Forged signature. Don’t give them time to see that it may not be exact. Turn the Double down on Deck and take the top card off deck … actually a Blue Backed Joker. Put this on table and put deck away! Take out the Red Back Jokers and Stanyon Count the 3 as 4 (like an Elmsley Count) both face up and face down. Next – face down, put the blue card – supposedly signed selection, into the face down red Jokers packet third from top. This way … as you Elmsley Count the packet face down – 4 Red Backs show! Wow! Since they thought you held 5 cards it seems like the Blue Backer (selection) vanished. NOW turn packet face up and spread to show clearly 4 Jokers – selection is gone! This of course was inspired by Elmsley’s POINT-OF-DEPARTURE and BETWEEN THE PALMS. *** ENDING: Put Jokers away! Take out Himber wallet. Open it to side with empty envelope. Take envelope out – open flap – let it be seen clearly empty. Put it back in wallet. Close Wallet. Patter – now open other side of wallet – take out envelope with Real Card with Real Signature – Put Wallet Away so all focus is on the envelope, not wallet. THE END more NEXT TIME (another)

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BOF BONUS 4-2012

BEYOND "BEST OF" FEEN-X Last time playing with color backs in relation to stargate (which evolved from CANNIBAL CARDS) & POINT of DEPARTURE & BETWEEN THE PALMS (Elmsley). Also in relation to THE ALL-NITE CARD (a Webb concept). The main additions were; using Jokers instead of Queens (slower false counts possible) & different color backs for extra mystery ... and the use of a Himber wallet for the STARGATE (instead of a lowly cardbox [which is still a practical way to go]). THIS INSTALLMENT: Another routine in this vein - yay! This time, though, there is a change in the faces, not the backs. Also with signature, and I'll recommend the one I use (a Forgery) that I taught before and most recently last issue. Needed: Himber wallet, coin envelopes, deck, several blank face cards with backs that match the deck. Also a sharpie! Setup: In the Himber you can put a blank-faced card in an envelope and put it in one side. You can put the other blank-face in your deck or in a pocket - out of play for the time being. PERFORM: 2 Phases: 1st Phase: You have to do a trick for whoever you plan to use for your last trick of the night. Be it the club president (or treasurer) or a girl of your choice ... you should know who you plan on ending on later. So ... do a trick for this person ... with a signed card -Ambitious card for instance. keep the card with Signature when done, for later. Don't give it out as a "souvenir"! SECOND PHASE: OK. Anytime during the rest of the evening you must take a break. Fair Enough - Bathroom Break, Smoke Break -- "Get something from your car" Break whatever. During the break is when you get out a dupe card from another deck and forge the person's name on the same place and you use the upside down & backwards timehonored technique of forging so your "hand" doesn't get into the other person's letters. *** OK, Finally; when the end of the evening comes, approach the "special person" and say "I want to show you one more thing." Note: You placed the Forgery second from the top of the deck (and on top place that other blank-facer you had in a pocket. I repeat - on top - blank facer, 2nd the Forgery.

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Next - place the Real Card with the real signature into the envelope in the other side of the Himber wallet. Perform Second Phase: Do a double turnover which shows the forgery on the dupe of same card they chose before. Say, "I still have your card here." Don't leave it in view too long, and in fact keep it moving slightly. Next turn the double down and hand the top card to the person to hold [a good idea is to have them put their other hand on top ... ... to prevent peeking.] Put deck away! (Pocket it ... don't even worry about the box ... it takes up too much time ... just ditch in a pocket.) Next, bring out the Himber Wallet. Open it to the side with the Blank faced Card. Take out the envelope and take out the blank faced card and show it! Put it back in the envelope and put envelope into Himber wallet and close wallet. Then, tap their hand with the wallet, then have them look at the card between their hands. They find a blank faced card! *** Next open the other side of the Himber, and take out that envelope and then take out the card therein, or let them do it (!) and there will be the real card with real signature which they can keep (and scrutinize) Have Fun next time.

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There are tricks that are too good, as students of the Too Perfect Theory realize, and there are tricks that aren't good at all. This one is "Just Right". There are harder tricks than this one, and easier tricks. This one is "Just Right". It came about by accident, yet through testing this has proven out to be what will probably be my best invention for a walk around card trick with a whole deck, not a packet trick, that doesn't need a table. That is an important consideration for that venue. "My Magic Card" ran in FEEN-X. As luck would have it, my good friend Charles Reynolds is also a world class magic consultant, and he noticed a way to make "My Magic Card" even better than it was, and it always went over beyond expectations, but with Mr. Reynolds's improvements this now ranks as a really special piece and one with an interesting lesson hidden in it. A trick doesn't have to be hard to be good when intended for laymen! And yet just the right kind of chemistry is created between you and the trick and the audience so that you have fun, the audience has fun, and the trick seems fair and clean to the point that at the climax women scream as a general rule. People don't backtrack or try to backtrack...the chemistry is so right! Effect: Performer shows his "magic card", and I always use the 2-C. Magician signs this card across the face. A spectator selects any other card and signs their name across that card's face. Magician loses his magic card in the deck. Next, the magician loses the spectators card in the deck also. Saying, "I can't find your card. It's lost in the deck - but I can always find my Magic Card because it always comes to the top of the deck". The 2-C is turned up to show that this is true and now the "Magic 2-C Card" is placed in the empty card box. The box is held by the spectator.

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Snapping his fingers over the box, the mage says, "Do you know what happens to my Magic Card when I do that?" "Why, it makes my Magic Card jump to my pocket", he says as he shows his empty right hand which then proceeds to produce the signed 2-C from his pocket as promised. Continuing, the mage says, "And when my Magic Card jumps to my pocket...guess what happens to the card in the box." Here the spectator is encouraged to open the box...and finds their signed selected card." And the audience response is always just right! Required: A deck. A card box that holds your deck. A duplicate 2-C. A Sharpie pen. Set-up: Sign you name across one 2-C and put in your pocket. A right pants pocket is just right. Have the other 2-C at the face of the deck. The Sharpie is anywhere handy. Performance: Take deck out of box and have anyone hold the box. Call attention to your 2-C Magic Card, and take out the Sharpie and sign it. Get a different spectator to take any other card and sign it. This is done from a face up deck and eliminates any need for turning away. Get a break between your 2-C and rest of face up deck. The spectator still holds their signed card. Double cut the Magic Card to the back of deck and turn deck face down. The Magic Card is now on top. Swing cut half the deck to your left hand and have the spectator put their card there. It goes right on top of the Magic Card. Place right hand's talon on top of all in the left hand but keep a break. Double undercut to the break and our setup is now on top. "I can't find your card, but I can always find my Magic Card" you say as you push over two, point to the top card and square getting a break under two. Continue, "My Magic Card always comes to the top." Double turnover, keeping a break under the now face-up double which shows the 2-C. Turn the double down, the previous break keeping you from any fumbling at this point. As you retrieve the box with your right hand, thumb way over the top card only (their signed selection) and now feed this card into the box very cleanly and give to the person who chose a card, after closing box. Snap your fingers over the box and say, "Do you know what happens when I do that?" Show your right hand empty and go to your right pocket and withdraw the duplicate signed Magic Card. Then put it back in the pocket. Snap your fingers over the box and say, "Do you know what happens when my card jumps to my pocket, to the card in the box?" Have spectator open the box and she will find her signed card! Merriment ensues! This always comes as a great surprise.

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Afterimages: This is essentially a transposition, but not exactly. It implies that the 2-C jumped from the box to the pocket and that their card jumped from middle of deck to the box. I used to do this with just the Magic 2-C signed with my own signature. The Charles Reynolds addition of having the spectator card signed also is a very strong bit of business that I just overlooked. It makes it even more powerful by eliminating any doubt that their card is the very same one, thereby cutting off any thoughts beginning about dupes. Once again, I only realized how strong this is by using it and noticing how the reaction is more than I as a magician would expect. We forget what it is like to be laymen, and therefore we tend to think like magicians about our work. There are more difficult tricks, but the extra difficulty causes undue strain that gets in the way of having fun with the spectators. History of the Trick: I think there is a valuable lesson in this trick, or I wouldn't be spending so much time on this analysis. First Incarnation: I would double lift and show "Your card isn't on top". Turning the double face down, I'd take the real top card which was their selection, and put it face down on their hand, snap my fingers, and reveal that it changed into their card. Second Incarnation: I later learned to remember the indifferent card that showed during the double lift, and at the end of the trick I'd palm that indifferent card to my pocket. Third Incarnation: I learned to emphasize the name of the indifferent card during the double lift, and to palm it out of my pocket first, then reveal the card on their hand had changed to their card afterwards! Here I began to realize which effect was primary and which was secondary. Leave the primary effect for last. Fourth Incarnation: Well, one day I dropped the card from my palm on the way to my pocket. I realized after the show that I could have a duplicate card in my pocket and contrive to have the matching card on top of deck from the start. At first I felt embarrassed that I went the "dupe" route because I didn't have enough confidence in my palming. Then I realized that showing the hand empty before going to the pocket was the disconnect for the viewers. Here was when I got the idea for the Sharpie, to take the curse off the dupe, and hoped viewers didn't notice that it wasn't true to form for me to sign my name. Also at this time I realized that I could lay the Sharpie on the face down card on their hand to prevent them peeking. Fifth Incarnation: I got the idea of using the card box from New York Cardman Doug Edwards. Sixth Incarnation: I got the idea of having the spectator sign her card and I'd sign my card from Charles Reynolds. CLEANUP and OTHER DETAILS.

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Note that after showing the dupe Magic Card from my pocket that I put it back in the pocket. After the trick is completely over is when I palm the original 2-C from the top of deck and go to my pocket and bring it out as if getting that card from the pocket to return it to the deck. Actually the dupe stays in the pocket. Leaving the signed card with the spectator is good! The deck gets a little smaller but workable. You need to carry extra 2-C cards, and discard the signed one each time so you start with a fresh one to sign each time, if you want to repeat this trick a number of times during your mingling. In conclusion, for laymen you don't have to do the long multiphase routines you might want to do for magicians. Study this trick to learn the kind of directness laymen in party mode need to be able to follow the plot and experience a bit of impossibility!

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