What Happened at the Meeting on Friday 20th February 2026

The theme of the night was "Ropes and Stuff", hosted by Noel Clair.

Noel started us off with an intricate rope routine. Knots were created magically at both ends of a rope before vanishing. Next, a knot made within a fully enclosed loop turns into two regular knots. Some dexterity was required to create a knot in a swaying rope. Another complete loop was created with the ends of the rope separating away into another rope before a knot appeared in the middle of the original rope loop. It could only be magic. Somehow Noel managed to undo the knot in the looped rope before adding a length of rope to the loop and restoring the rope to a single length with two ends for the finale. Loopy!

John Ferguson offered up a number of books with magic instructions, including some very old translated magic notes and manuals. Also on offer was a large number of convention notes, some internet prints, a collection of pamphlets, including "Happy Magic" magazines, some magic for teaching and various other rare materials. The translated olde English explanation of tricks formerly believed to be witchcraft is a good read.

Raquel demonstrated a card trick with Neal as a volunteer. Neal selected a card before Raquel created a number of piles or shapes with the cards and asked the audience whether a card was in each group. She then put the cards in two piles with a little help from Neal, before eliminating a pile, dividing again, choosing again and eliminating again, all with the help of Neal's hand which was hovering. After a few more eliminations the correct card was revealed.

Mia's magic was so fast we almost missed it. She shows a single large die in a jar which suddenly turns into numerous small dice after a shake. A second performance was required so the whole room could capture the magic.

Joel Howlett performed a dextrous and polished routine, starting with a blue magic 'wishing' flash paper that turned into a genuine large coin. The coin disappears with some help from a magic sharpie. The swift routine includes the coin becoming a pen, the pen becoming a coin, a knuckle coin roll and coin through hand with some impressive sleight. The coin then appears and disappears again behind a scarf. Just when we thought the coin would show up again, a whole shoe appears behind the scarf. What?! Next came some audience participation. John Ferguson just thinks of a card and one card appears under the box, it's the Joker (Wildcard). Moments later we try again and now it's the chosen card under the box. Following this, the box and card turn into just the card and the stack of cards appears underneath the deck over the other side of the table. This act is 100% ready for Vegas!

David Whitson showed a change bag with an empty zippered bottom. A set of colourful scrunchies go in and come out linked. Now the scrunchies go back in and come out as a single length with multiple colours. David then performed the equal unequal ropes (aka Professor's Nightmare) with thick ropes. Of course, the ropes become the same length then moments later revert back to short, medium and long. David also demonstrated the equal unequal ropes with magic wand style crotchet props. The next trick involved two red ropes, one short, one long, which quickly become a single rope. Rapid fire magic! David continued the routine with a rope that knots itself as it is passed through a clear tube. After the five knots are untied manually they then turn into four new knots upon repetition. David finished his act with four coloured ropes which, after being tied into four separate loops, are revealed as a single multicolored circle.

Steve Irwin told a story about Egyptian cotton. The cotton shown is rotten and keeps breaking. A wizard pharoah took all the broken pieces of cotton and magically put them back together into one piece. An impressive effect from antiquity.

Noel rounded out the night with a medium ring and shoelace style string. The intricate routine starts with rope through finger, before the ring joins the string and is removed magically. Even with a loop knot the ring passes straight through again. With help from a volunteer, the rope is double looped onto the ring but is pulled dirctly off once again. The ring is placed onto the string again right up in front of the eyes and in slow motion. One last time, the ring goes onto the string under the light and at a slant, something that is very clearly impossible and rather stunning! Noel's last trick was with a green shoelace which he calls the security rope. A small ring is legitimately threaded on but comes straight through immediately. It melts straight through on a second repetition as well. Even with the ring wrapped onto the rope, secured, and with a volunteer holding the rope, the ring still comes through. The conclusion was a fast removal of the ring one last time and then an instant return. Very impressive!!

What Happened at the Meeting on Friday 9th January 2026

The theme of the night was "Free Choice", hosted by David Whitson.

David Whitson started us off with a few gags, including Trix, a fried egg due to the heat, a toast for the New Year and an all red Rubik's Cube for beginners. There was also a plastic melted ice cream gag and the classic bifocal close up glasses with eyes on springs. On the magic front, David performed a convincing effect with large cards depicting Africa and various wild animals. With the Africa folder sitting on one side, the Cheetah appears in various locations behind large cards before jumping across to the folder. Uganda be kidding me!

Noel then performed some coin magic, including single coin through table, then three coins together through the table. He also demonstrated coins jumping from one hand to the other with arms outstretched and three coins from a small steel box right through the table and into a glass. Next up was a large ring that goes onto a shoelace but then merges straight through. The ring is then tied securely onto the shoelace before coming off again. Following this, the large ring is thrown onto the lace and captured instantly. Finally the ring is impossibly put onto the shoelace very slowly in full view of everyone. Impressive! On the same theme, a small finger ring was merged straight through a green shoelace (Aka "security rope"), before sliding straight off twice. The third time, the ring comes off the shoelace after audience participation and appears on Noel's finger. To finish, Noel demonstrated another quick throw on and off of the ring on the green shoelace at the end.

Steve Irwin was next, starting off with a good joke. His card trick has two Jacks set up as investigators and various cards as suspects. A card is selected before the pack is put together and cut, then dealt out in a down/under method. The final suspect (card) is found, revealed and correct! For his following card trick, three piles are created. Noel chooses a card freely from one of the piles and returns it. After this, five hand poker piles are dealt face up. Steve asks which pile the card showed up in and was able to quickly and easily reveal the selected card. This is a great simple effect and all were pleased to get an explanation of the method from Steve.

Neil finished off the night demonstrating a memory effect with a wallet. Noel viewed a card with symbols, promising to remember them all and signing his name on it. David Whitson took it out of the wallet and held onto it for safe keeping. After performing a chant, Neil made Noel forget one of the shapes he saw. Noel recalled that there was a triangle, a circle and a square, but the signed card held by David Whitson revealed that a cross had been completely forgotten, perhaps due to the mystical memory erasing chant!

What Happened at the Meeting on Friday 21st November 2025

The theme of the night was "Free Choice", hosted by Neil.

Noel started off with some large coins and a disappearing coin routine. The coins absorbed, vanished and changed - At one point the large silver coin became a gold coin before changing again into a sponge ball. This led into a sponge ball routine with some beautifully smooth sleights. Noel finished by performing a convict escape story with 8 bottle caps that move from under the left hand to the right as the convicts escape from jail.

David Whitson demonstrated magic that he will be using in the new year, including a caution deck with several decorative fan methods and a showing of the Viking Magic diminishing cards. Next up was a poker hand routine where Warden had a freely chosen series of 5 cards. This left five cards for the magician. Warden ended up with a full house but of course the magician won with a straight flush. David has also made a self constructing jumbo card tower that can be created rapidly. A large "Woo Hoo" banner accentuated a number of performances.

Raquel performed a brief but funny routine with a moving crocodile that has a little accident right on the table. Steve Irwin would approve!

Warden brought a massive book of Fairy Magic from Rex, donated by Eric in Melbourne to the NSOM, which included multiple Rex artefacts such as books, articles, documents, programs, cue cards, tricks including an egg bag and breakaway wand, a silk factory, several props and some schematics. Warden notes that the Magic Circle in Melbourne scanned everything in for their archives as well.

As an encore, Noel performed the jumping dots routine with a standard table knife. Cutting edge!

What Happened at the Meeting on Friday 17th October 2025

The theme of the night was "Free Choice" and was accentuated by thunder and lightning outside!

David Whitson started by demonstrating raining money using a Supreme branded dollar bill dispenser.

Mia was taken with this and repeated the performance before showing a clever and convincing split pencil. The pencil is shown whole, suddenly split into three and then magically restored shortly afterwards.

Joel was up next with some concepts developed through his work as an MC. He started with a series of funny laminated phrases before moving on to a number of humorous notices and advertisements in a newspaper. Next up was a mathematical notebook that goes over the number of days worked by the average person each year with a surprising conclusion. Finally Joel performed an effect involving silks and a long candle all from a small rectangular box which is repeatedly shown empty. Impressive!

Steve Irwin dazzled us with a brief but effective coin manipulation routine involving three large coins. They all disappeared faster than the eye could follow.

David Whitson started with the classic levitating wand behind the palm, followed by a polished Spots Before Your Eyes routine. He ended his series of effects using a change bag containing various silks with partial variants of the Australian Flag. After several changes he was able to reveal and display a full Australian Flag. 

What Happened at the Meeting on Friday 15th August 2025

The theme of the meeting was "Free Choice" (again) hosted by David Whitson.

David Whitson started things off with an impressive and well executed white cane to scarf.

Al then demonstrated a card routine with rows of cards narrowing down to a single selection. This was themed to the story of depth charges and submarines in World War 2. The single depth charge hits the chosen card and we learned a lot about radar in the process.

Noel performed a transposition, turning a large silver coin into gold and then back again, before following up with a routine involving coins appearing from nowhere and being caught one after the other in a metal goblet.

John used his knowledge of chemistry, taking a red liquid from a bottle and pouring it into a regular plastic cup before turning it upside down to reveal no liquid at all, only a dry red silk falling out of the cup. He followed this up with a card effect using photocopies. John showed various double sided black and white photocopies of a pile of cards, noting that only one card is face down. He turned the copy around to reveal that an earlier freely selected card was the only one facing the other way. 

Steve Irwin convincingly performed a baffling self winding bolt several times in a very close up environment. He also performed a stunning trick with three cards from a borrowed deck. The spectator chooses one card in secret and then mixes up all three. Moments later Steve is always able to reveal their chosen card.

Warden continued the theme of goblets, this time four of them with a poisoned message in three. Spectactors freely chose three goblets and then were able to switch several times at will. Upon opening the messages, all three spectators had chosen the poison while Warden was left with the safe goblet. Killer material!

As an encore, Noel performed a quick coin through table complete with sound effects.

Finally David Whitson used a change bag to share a great routine with knitted coloured coils. First the separate different coloured coils are changed into linked coils. Next they are changed again into a single long piece of coloured rope. Finally, much like the colour spectrum, all of the colours change into a single length of white rope. David also showed the empty Tarbell cone, modified to make a heart, before producing a red silk from inside. Next was a silk penetration contraption from the Graham Holstein estate. A long multicoloured silk is threaded through then chopped with a wooden card that has a hole in the middle. Upon removal, the wooden card has the silk threaded through the hole. Utterly convincing! To finish off, David performed a routine with sticks, tassels and a mysterious relationship between them.

What Happened at the Meeting on Friday 18th July 2025

The theme of the meeting was "Free Choice" hosted by JD.

Al commenced the performances with an educational back and forth about the different Australian coins before performing an effective routine of coin transpositions using playing cards and five cent pieces.

Raquel performed a convincing card trick with three piles representing the soccer teams for Portugal, Argentina and Qatar. With help from Dianne she was able to correctly predict and reveal a "drafted player" in the form of a card revealed.

Still working with cards, Steve Irwin had an audience member freely select a card and then later any number. He carefully counted through to accurately reveal the chosen card at the exact number that was specified.

Next it was Mia's turn and she presented a convincing demonstration of the magic rising wand.

Joel showed three lengths of coloured rope tied at both ends. After extending them out and repeating the simple knots, the three separate pieces were merged into a single length of rope and the knots disappeared. Very impressive! Joel also stunned with a variant of the cups and balls that started with a card selection, continued with a standard cups and balls routine using balls of paper, was accentuated as the balls turned into flashes of flame and finished with the selected card appearing under a cup. An excellent combination!

David Whitson finished with the sudden production of a bunch of $100 notes in the form of a bouquet. He also demonstrated a change bag with a varying collection of silks, some with mismatched holiday phrases. Next was a paint tin that was shown empty but later revealed a variety of sponge shapes, especially hearts of different sizes. After sharing some Magic Club badges for members that did not already have one, David finished by reciting a 52 card love story using all of the cards in a jumbo deck.

What Happened at the Meeting on Friday 23rd June 2023

The theme of the meeting was “Bar Betchas” hosted by Jeff Clarke, who led off with several items.  He did the “Giraffe turn around” and the “Fish  turn around” using kebab sticks.          Next, he dropped three dice into a glass of water.   Drawing attention to the numbers visible on the dice, he asked us to predict the total of the numbers on the bottom of the dice.

David Whitson  displayed mismade flags – A Union Jack without blue colour, a Union Jack with red but no blue, and the flag of Australia, correctly coloured.  These he produced from a change bag.  He also showed us large posters – “Stop Pollution” from his antipollution show.

One item performed by Jeff Clarke was repeated by David Blunden – he did the Fish again with kebab sticks.  He also did the “squashed dog”.  Laying out a mathematical equation with the kebab sticks, he showed how to solve it with a minimum of moves.   He asked a spectator to “Do As I Do” – to copy his moves, and the spectator was unable to do so.

Steve Irwin has been preparing for our show later in the year, and he rehearsed his introduction for us.

Joel Howlett did a Spiderman Card trick. In this he used a deck with a card that had a spider inked on it. The he exchanged torn corners of playing cards.  He tore a corner off, gave it to a spectator to hold, tore a corner off a different car, and then magically swapped the corners over.

The “Piano Card Trick” is fully explained in “Royal Road to Card Magic” page 119, and this was performed by John Ferguson.  Two piles of card are dealt, and one odd card is added to the pile chosen by spectator.  Magically, the magician makes the odd pile become an “even” pile, and you can’t see the odd card magically move over.  He gave us two URLs of youtube videos – performance and tutorial :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFY7YOv-zEg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCRY5Guppck