Yesterday I went up to Treadwell's bookshop in Covent Garden to meet some other magicians and hypnothists and then experience a real live seance! Very spooky stuff. Sitting in a completely blacked out room while various "phenomena" manifested themselves was bizarre to say the least. We had ESP, hypnosis, glass moving, table tilting and more. How much was the activity of ghosts and how much was "magic tricks" I can't be sure - but it was certainly an interesting experience.
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Henley is currently hosting HIFF (the Henley International Film Festival) and I went along to do a bit of magic and mind-reading to add to the fun. More lovely weather and an enthusiastic audience made this a real pleasure. The festival is on for a couple more days and there are some real obscure delights on show. Or you can head into the "Hot Gossip" coffee bar - they are showing films on their back wall for you to watch over your latte. There is a real buzz in the town and Henley is a lovely place to visit at any time. Stroll by the river, feed the ducks, browse the boutiques and enjoy some excellent food. Definitely recommended for a day out. And hopefully I will be back there doing more magic soon.
I spent yesterday doing magic at Steve and Alicia's party in Reading. Great weather made it a perfect day for a BBQ and the food was top notch (i.e. not burnt on the outside and uncooked on the inside as at some BBQs!). There was only a light breeze which was good as playing cards have a habit of blowing about rather too easily when performing outdoors. I also got to do lots of mind-reading and even a bit of palm-reading for Alicia's mum! Thanks Steve and Alicia - looking forward to performing for you again at the wedding later in the year!
I often perform magic at pubs in my home town of Wokingham - as a form of entertainment it makes a nice change to karaoke and quiz nights. It's always fun to involve people in some card magic or mind-reading while they enjoy a pint of beer or glass of wine. Earlier this week, while out performing, I was accompanied by the very talented photographer Nia Kime and her partner Darren - you will see the results appearing in various places on this website shortly. In the meantime here is a taster of me reading the mind of Luna the Wonderdog. I'm pretty sure this was the card she was thinking of....!
I've had the pleasure of recently working with photographer Jon Baggaley. He provided some of the pictures that you will find on this website. We spent some time on "light painting" - using a very long exposure (upto 30 seconds), standing very still and "drawing" with a strong light source such as a glow stick or sparkler. It's a fiddly process but you can get some very original results - see below. It was a lot of fun - thanks Jon!
I spent yesterday doing magic at the Cotswold Wildlife Park near Burford. Lovely weather and lots of friendly people and animals made the whole day a real delight. I especially enjoyed meeting and feeding Gomez the tapir, although luckily he didn't try to eat the 4 of Hearts I was holding.
As a magician I spend a lot of time ordering things on the Internet and going into the few remaining "bricks and mortar" magic shops dotted around the UK. However the next most useful source of magical items is your average stationery shop - like W.H.Smiths! You can find all sorts of useful things in there that will help you to "design miracles". I can't reveal any specifics but a quick look round should give you some interesting ideas, especially in the section for adhesives and pens! Let your imagination run wild!
P.S. Not sure when to use "stationARy" and "stationERy"? Try this reminder - "the cAR is stationARy" and "the papER is stationERy". It works for me! I spent yesterday down in Portsmouth with James Brown (Close-Up Magician of the Year winner) and Paul Newton, talking magic and hypnosis. Great day with lovely weather. I came away with lots of new ideas for magic routines and tweaks to my hypnotic inductions.
My new business cards have just arrived and look rather nice. I tend to use VistaPrint for this sort of thing as they are very quick and reliable - although they will spam you for ever more! From now on when someone asks for my business card this is what they will get...
While up in London yesterday I wandered over to Parliament Square which was buzzing with all of the election/hung parliament/coalition news. There were two helicopters in the air, film crews everywhere, TV news people, MPs and interested members of the public all milling about. It was quite fun! I managed to get a picture with the now unemployed ex-MP Lembit Opik. He was a very nice friendly chap. Wonder what he'll do now?
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