The host for the evening, David Whitson, led off with an
attention-getting trick using a drink can that he smashed into his
forehead. (The can had flexible plastic
sides.)
Since the Theme was “Ropes, Strings, and Things”, David
moved on to several ways of tying knots in a rope without using his hands. One method was crossing his arms first, and
picking up the ends of the rope while his arms were crossed, then uncrossing
them.
Noel Clair did several items with rope. He threaded a shoelace through a plastic
frame, then moved the frame so that it cut the shoelace into two parts, then
moved the parts together and extracted the shoelace restored whole. He did ring off rope and ring on rope by
several methods with very neat flourishes.
Next was finger ring on and off his finger.
Moving into his rope routine, he performed appearing knots
on ends of rope, one full knot to two half knots, rope to circle of rope and
back to straight rope. He took the ends
off the rope and put them back on again.
Noel’s use of a finger ring led to a general discussion
among the members of whether to use a borrowed ring in these days of suing and
litigation. There was a danger of being
sued for damage to a ring by a dishonest person when no damage had actually
been caused by the magician.
In response to a question from Noel, we discussed how to
achieve a talon of eight known cards on the bottom of the deck in the middle of
a card trick when the deck has been in use.
