Ellusionist.com knows we are vulnerable and yet taunts with offers of up to 30 percent off magic we want (need) if we buy in the next three days.
Yes, we freely admit we have a problem with Magic.
The deficiency is found not in the craft but in our soul. Our double-wide (practically, just shy of a true "double wide" as defined by the ISO) is about to burst at its aluminum strip covered seams with magic purchased and never used.
Our stage routine has not changed significantly since 1972 and our close-up presentation is identical to that which earned us the 1974 Florida State Magicians' Convention First-Place trophy. So, counting each deck of cards utilized as a separate trick and not counting the Atomic Light as magic but more as a novelty, we use a total of seven "tricks" in both shows combined. If we learned to do a false shuffle, we'd be down to five tricks total.
Our insurance inventory sheet, however, details 421 separate pieces of magic equipment and 1,901 magic books in hard or soft cover. If the Magic Trailer ever went up in a blaze, we could replace both of our shows for just over $35.00; not including a table. We could collect about six hundred times that figure for the loss of our "magic collection."
Perhaps your collection is our size our larger. Maybe you are just starting your collection of unused tricks in a spare dresser drawer or trunk. Each time you attend a convention, watch a lecture or visit a magic shop you likely add to the stockpile of regrets and forgotten promises.
We're not psychopathic or even amnesiac, but when we are given an opportunity to buy a magic trick (in our very low price range) we usually take full advantage. We then return home to inventory the new effect, perhaps open it from its wrapping, maybe even read the instructions, and, possibly, try it once or twice. We don't intentionally put it into the collection and when we purchase it we never think it will be anything but the primary effect of our new act.
If we performed the new act for which we have purchased so many effects over the years, we would be on stage for more than two weeks. This assumes we did not overly milk the sucker effects like "Fraidy Cat Rabbit," "Run Rabbit Run," "Run Wolf Run," "Run Monster Run," "Hippity Hop Rabbits," "Sucker Sliding Die Box," "Shamrock Sucker Sliding Die Box," "Classic Sucker Sliding Die Box," "Nu-View Sucker Sliding Die Box," and "The McCombical Deck."
