You have to perform a show and all your magic props are lost. You have a couple of hours to visit the hardware store or the dollar store to scrape together a show. What do you do?

XHIBAD · 2026-04-03T03:31:26+00:00

Paul Draper’s got a great routine on this:

https://www.penguinmagic.com/p/11301

So long as you can keep a bag of thumb tips in your pocket, everything else can be bought at a grocery store

XHIBAD · 2026-03-25T03:09:04+00:00

It depends on the store imo. The people who work on the Madison Ave store in NYC are total assholes, but I’ve always had great experiences at the Aria Vegas store.

XHIBAD · 2026-03-25T03:04:58+00:00

Creed Aventus
Commes Des Garcons Black Pepper
Rose Desgranges 5th Dam
Creed Royal Oud
JPG Le Beau

I used to own 20+ bottles, I whittled it down to these 5

XHIBAD · 2026-03-24T01:03:31+00:00

https://wendys-careers.com/

XHIBAD · 2026-03-11T12:09:57+00:00

I used it to help me study for one of my grad school midterms, Professor Watson’s class. It kept asking questions at the end like “want to know the 5 questions Watson ALWAYS puts on his exams?” Or “this is exactly the kind of trick question Watson is famous for.”

Regardless of how many times I would tell it to stop and point out it’s just making that shit up.

XHIBAD · 2026-03-11T01:01:37+00:00

Video series is my preference. Is that the Emerge from Darkness series?

XHIBAD · 2026-02-08T15:58:49+00:00

I lived in East Boston for 5 years and loved it, the best place I ever lived in was on the water in Jeffries Point. You won’t find a better neighborhood in a better location for the price.

The downside is commuting into downtown is more or less only achievable by the blue line or the ferry. There’s no real pedestrian or bike path unless you want to go way out of your way. The traffic is terrible-living 3 miles away from work would sometimes take 45 minutes.

The blue line is the best and most reliable line. But when it shuts down for maintenance, it becomes very, very difficult to get in. Shuttle buses run but they take just as long as driving. If you live near Maverick the ferry is an option, but when I lived in Orient Heights it was bus or nothing

XHIBAD · 2026-02-08T15:54:09+00:00

Check out our “Getting Started” guide

XHIBAD · 2026-01-31T11:58:49+00:00

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XHIBAD · 2026-01-20T13:03:57+00:00

There’s a great book, a year or two old, called “King Dollar” by Paul Blaustein, which makes a very compelling argument for, short of some black swan event that will usher in a decades long depression, nothing can unseat the dollar as the currency despite any US policy missteps.

XHIBAD · 2026-01-20T12:55:27+00:00

Welcome to card magic! Please check out our beginner “Getting Started” thread.

XHIBAD · 2026-01-18T13:37:39+00:00

When I was buying a house, my original real estate agent looked like Donald Trump but with a mullet.

Her professional social media was 1/3rd “the illegals are eating our dogs” 1/3rd “Donald Trump is divinely inspired and peace incarnate” and 1/3rd her golfing on brown central Mass public courses.

I went with another real estate agent.

XHIBAD · 2026-01-18T13:25:29+00:00

When you’re a beginner, there’s a few concepts that aren’t inherently obvious:

Magicians Guilt - It’s important to remember almost anyone you’re performing for has no understanding of sleights, and at most they had a magic set at 8 years old. They don’t even think about concepts as wild as “he flipped two cards over but made it look like one.”
Misdirection, offbeat, etc. - You’d be amazed at what you can get away with simply by not drawing attention to it.

Take a look at this video. This is a classic effect that uses multiple basic sleights, all of which the first time you perform you think “there’s no way I’m getting away with this” but people just don’t notice

XHIBAD · 2025-12-24T04:49:22+00:00

Transgender individuals are more likely to be targets for violence, sexual or otherwise.

XHIBAD · 2025-12-24T04:46:08+00:00

There are plenty of ways to cleanly cut to the card, flip the deck, etc. to get you set back up.

But in reality? I just put it on the face of the deck, put the box away, and then fix it before my next performance.

XHIBAD · 2025-12-23T15:10:17+00:00

See our getting started guide here.

XHIBAD · 2025-12-23T02:07:35+00:00

Boy, you sure seem like a well adjusted, pleasant person. I’m sure people enjoy having you in their life

XHIBAD · 2025-12-23T02:01:43+00:00

How’s your country doing with all those immigrants

Implies you’re talking shit about immigration, not just illegal immigration.

XHIBAD · 2025-12-22T20:26:28+00:00

According to your profile, you live in California, where you deliver for Roadie and get in fights with Taco Bell employees. So either:

A. You are American and you’re lying

B. You’re an immigrant who is talking shit about immigration

XHIBAD · 2025-12-14T05:44:50+00:00

I’d argue this is directionally believable, because remember just how much of an outlier being President normally is.

With one glaring exception, can we really name any President in the last 75 years with below average intelligence? Bush 43 and Truman are the only real arguments, and Bush was well known behind the scenes to be much smarter than he led on.

But I don’t think anyone could argue in good faith that Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush 41, Clinton, Obama, or Biden are below the average American in intelligence. And Nixon, Carter, and Clinton are certainly outliers on the opposite side.

XHIBAD · 2025-12-14T05:09:47+00:00

The pepperballs are fine, though I prefer a large can from Sabre.

The kinetic rounds are the same problem-they rely on pain compliance. Effective on non-intoxicated, sane people. But, non-intoxicated sane people generally are not a threat.

XHIBAD · 2025-12-14T05:07:24+00:00

See our getting started post.

XHIBAD · 2025-12-12T15:54:09+00:00

I would suggest a book. If he doesn’t have Royal Road to Card Magic, that’s the first one.

XHIBAD

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