So last night I called up a friend I'd given an old darkroom enlarger to. She was having problems getting it working and I was supposed to go help her. I offered to go last night, but she said she was thinking about going to see David Copperfield who was in town for one night.

I'd brought this up to my wife when we'd seen it in the paper and immediately got some disparaging remarks about magic. "Gaaaaay", I think she said. So I'd forgotten about it.

But now that it was brought to my attention again, I was intrigued. I like magic, and had missed the chance to see Copperfield a couple of times when I was in Rochester. So I decided to go.

I met up at the theater box office and Claudia and her friend were already there. The only tickets left were some $37.50 ones about a mile from the stage, or some $44 ones 10 rows from the stage. So we blew the extra bucks. Little did I know just how choice these seats were.

Throughout the course of his performance, Copperfield uses people from the audience. He's got a couple of different kinds of tricks.

He's got minor things, which while being pretty decent magic in their own right, aren't super mysterious. They're more funny. Like when he had two women get up and exchanged their underwear. These people really are members of the audience, but a couple of things involved a little preparation, so I think they got yanked ahead of time and told what they'd be doing.

Then there were the totally random audience selections. And this is how he picked people. He'd take various things and toss them into the audience. He used these soft, flexible frisbees a lot. And this light little baseball sized plastic ball. And some other things.

But the really neat thing about where we were sitting is that when he'd stand in the middle of the stage and toss something over his shoulder, it'd pretty much fall in my lap almost every time.

The first time he tossed a frisbee I just missed it and the woman in front of me grabbed it. The next time a person a couple of rows back got it. A time after that it bounced off my fingers and a guy two seats down grabbed it. Then he tossed the silver ball and I caught it! But did I get picked? No, I had to toss it behind me and the next chick that caught it got picked. Bleh.

So I'm thinking it's a big conspiracy against me and he doesn't like bald guys or some shit. So I've missed my chance god knows how many times.

Then we come to the grande finale. He's going to pick 13 audience members at random and make them all disappear. He's got 13 of these big silver rubber balls. Like the things at the gym you use to stretch out your back, if you've ever seen them. Some are bigger than others. And they all get chucked out into the audience. There's music playing, and he says when the music stops, whoever is holding the balls gets picked.

So of course a few fly right toward me, but I know fate is against me, so I just whack 'em really hard and they fly back into the audience. So I'm turned around and standing up with everyone else, watching the chaos of these balls flying around the theater. It looks pretty neat. But pretty much I've resigned myself to being a loser that never gets picked.

Then suddenly the music stops and bonk, a ball falls into my hands. And one of the women I was with.

So I got to go up on stage and I got disappeareded.

And it was cool.

Then afterwards they ushered us into this dinky little laundry room in the back of the theater while we were waiting for everyone to leave so they wouldn't pester us with questions. I think it was really so they could clear some of the magic apparatus off the stage so we would see what was going on.

Whatever the case, after about five minutes David came back himself and told us if we ever told anyone what we'd seen he'd kill us.

Ha. No, actually he explained that he and other people spent an awful lot of time making the illusion, and if we went and spilled the secret we were bastards.

The beauty of the whole thing is that I really don't understand what the fuck they did. It was wonderfully confusing, and I'm pretty sure when they told us how they did it they were just laying down a line of bullshit that they were hoping we'd blab to everyone we knew just to obfuscate the issue.

Whatever the case, I totally disappeared. And that's all the matters. And I got a signed picture, which I'll treasure forever.

The End.

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100 pounds of shit in a 25 pound sack.

The only thing that really makes me feel like ass is the woman who'd brought up the idea to Cindy and I had to sit in the audience and watch. And while we were meeting him, she was standing in the lobby holding our coats.

She probably hates us both now.

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100 pounds of shit in a 25 pound sack.

GAH!

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Jesus saves, but everyone else in a 10 foot radius takes full damage from the fireball.

I've done deck crew for some magic shows and it's cool to watch the illusions happen form the wings. They make the crew sign papers saying that if we reveal any of the methods of the illusionist's craft, we'd be fist fucked by enough attorneys to make a third year Harvard Law preppie puke.

The breakaway box illusion is cool to see from the side of the stage, I can tell you.

They do blow a lot of smoke up your ass when they're disappearing you, yeah, and they count on you being just a little twitchy and eager to help.

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I wanted my half in the middle and I wound up on the edge.

magic is cool.

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Batman created by Bob Kane

So, be sure to tell us sometime!

so looking at the picture im guessing all these years ive imagined the dude from knightrider and baywatch doing magic are just a dream eh?

fuck

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Who knows what fear lurks in the hearts of men? MIKE BOBSICO KNOWS! And if you give him a decent tip when he delivers your mail , he might tell you.

quote:

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so looking at the picture im guessing all these years ive imagined the dude from knightrider and baywatch doing magic are just a dream eh?

fuck

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*laugh*

At what point did he take you up the ass?

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"Jelly-belly gigglin, dancin and a-wigglin, honey that's the way I am!" Janice the Muppet

At the insertion point.

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I ate a hooker half a bottle of knife.