When the grind actually does something

 I've had a trick that I've done since I was in my early 20's.    And I never much cared for it.

I thought the concept was killer.   The lines were great.  But the actual mystery of the trick was miniscule.   And it had no ending.

But every so often, I take it out, and give it a try.  I devised an ending...and it was better.

But still not great.

Until today....after about 40 years of messing with this trick, I have figured out a way to improve the mystery AND preserve the ending.   Without a ton of extra work.

Me be happy!!1!!

 

www.LarryBrodahl.com

BestOmahaMagician.com

Magician fools self

 Today, the most amazing thing happened.   I'd just opened a brand new deck of cards, shuffled them a dozen or so times, and started to practice a trick.

And I knew for a fact that the bottom card of the deck was a 6 of Spades.   But when I dealt the top card of the deck face up....it was a 6 of Spades.  I was buffaloed... no clue what had happened.

Imagine my confusion when I spread out the deck and saw a deck of all diamonds and Spades...with just a sprinkling of Clubs.

In all of my years....and all of the 1000's of decks I've gone through, I've never had a misboxed deck.   I've had decks with rough cut marks, I've had decks with severe warpage....but NEVER a misbox.

As you can see in the picture above, I have 2 of every Diamond, except the Jack, Queen and King.

I have 2 of every Spade, and I have standalone 10,J,Q,K of Clubs.

And I realize I could send the Ace of Spades back to Bicycle and they'd send me a new deck.....but I'd rather keep this deck as a reminder of what it feels like to be fooled.

www.LarryBrodahl.com

www.BestOmahaMagician.com

Magic stuff

 Well, it's going to be a first for me, but I'm going to write an occasional posting about magic.  Mainly parlor and stage material.

The thing that caused this to happen was Google dropping me from their search queue for a few months, which caused a huge dropoff of visitors and bookings to my www.LarryBrodahl.com website.

And those few months without bookings made me realize just how much magic has done for me, and how much I enjoy it.

So, I'm going to write down things that I know and have used.  I'll try to stay away from theory as much as is practical, but in all cases, YOUR MILEAGE MAY VARY.

I'll start off with a topic near and dear to my heart.

Making your own props and gimmicks.   Or at least modifying them.

Most stage tricks that you can buy from the dealers look horrible.  They're either over-painted/over-designed, which lends a "carnival/circus" look to the act, or they're painted in dark tones that can't be seen once the audience is 10 feet away.

Your entire act should feel complete.   And if you go from a "jungle" theme to a schoolboy theme, to a space age theme, you're being painfully obvious that your act is comprised of pieces that you BOUGHT that don't fit together.

I want my act to look as if it's stuff that I bought at the Dollar Store, or is composed of home furnishings.   

 Because I think that if they see a paper bag instead of a shiny red cloth with gold tassels bag on a purple stick...well, I think they'll believe my bag to be much more innocent.

And that's what makes magic, to me anyhow.

I'll try to update this semi-frequently and see how it goes.'