H.Res.642 — 114th Congress (2015-2016

Yes! It's finally happening! No more atomic wedgies and holding me by my ankles to dip my head in the toilet. I'm finally going to get some respect as a magician. When I mistakenly vanish a banana instead of a bandana, people are going to recognize that what I'm doing is a rare and valuable art form and a national treasure. Don't believe me? Well they're going to have to because it's practically going to be the law, you fucking dummies. U.S.A.!U.S.A.! M.A.G.I.C.! M.A.G.I.C.!

Finally, I won't have to keep trying to convince people that what I'm showing them is worthwhile. They will simply be able to look up the legislation that says it is. Because that's how you know you're really respected as an art form, when you have to try and mandate that people show it some respect. 

"Bu-bu-bu-but Andy, what evidence do you have that magic is a national treasure and a rare and valuable art form?" Oh, gee, I don't know. Why don't you read the text of that resolution and find out? What's the problem? Afraid of having your mind blown by the amazing contributions magic has made to society? Go ahead and read it. When you're done you'll be like, "Uhm, can someone tell me why we teach science in school and not magic?" 

Here are just some of the important contributions magic has made to this country and the world:

-- Did you know that out of the millions of people David Copperfield has performed for, one of them took a dance class after seeing his show. It's true!

-- Did you know that the mayor of a Texas city uses magic to teach elementary school students about the different roles and responsibilities of local government? Now that sounds like some compelling stuff. And it certainly should be singled out as representative of the heights of what the art can achieve. 

-- Did you know Leonardo da Vinci co-wrote a magic book? Well, that's because he didn't. His friend wrote it. But that's practically co-writing it. 

-- Did you know Arthur C. Clarke once wrote a sentence with the word magic in it? The sentence isn't about magic. It's intended to be a commentary on technology. But still though, that's pretty impressive. Out of all the words in the world, he mentioned magic.

Yes, these are the examples that were chosen from the past few centuries of magic to suggest that magic is a vibrant, thriving, and important art form. What other conclusion could you draw? Did I mention the girl who took dance lessons after seeing a Copperfield show? I did? Okay, just wanted to make sure. 

My hope is that this resolution passes and that we can finally, FINALLY, get the respect we deserve. It will be so meaningful to have it written into a resolution. So much better than actually earning it. It's like when you're in 4th grade and you send out your birthday invitations and no one replies so your dad calls the parents of all the kids in your class and makes them promise to come and offers to give them money to spend on a present. You know, an organic showing of appreciation like that. 

I'm so happy Washington D.C. is finally focusing on the important things. Make Magic Great Again! Forgetful Freddy for U.S. Senate! The bill in lemon should be a law in lemon!

Project Slay-Them: Outer Preparation and Inner Preparation

[This is the second in a series of posts for people who would like to perform for people more but don't. If you're not in that category then some of this advice won't apply to you.]

If you don't perform much for people, maybe you think showing magic to people outside the context of an actual show would seem annoying or awkward or corny or like you're desperate for attention. You're absolutely right. It does seem that way very often.

But this is not something that's unique to magic. If you walked up to someone and said, "Hey, how are you doing? Mind if I sing a song for you? A-may-zing graaaaaaaace.... how sweeeeet the sounnnnddd... that saaaaved aaaaa wretch like....ah-MEEEEeeeEEeeEEE!!!" And closed your eyes, put one index finger in your ear and the other one towards the heavens, that too would come off as annoying, awkward, corny, and desperate for attention. If you asked someone if you could juggle for them, recite a monologue for them, or tap dance for them, you would get a similar response that people give when you ask to perform magic. You see this response frequently in online demos where the magician is performing for "regular people." And you can tell the person has acquiesced to watch the trick only because it would be more awkward to say no.

I bring this up because I think some of us get hung up on it being a little goofy to perform magic for people when you're at a party or at a bar or something. But actually it's a little goofy to perform anything in those situations. What we need to concern ourselves with is removing the "performance" aspect of showing magic in casual situations. We don't need to remove magic altogether. This is something we will explore more in future posts, but it's a foundational idea of getting out there and doing more magic in casual settings so it's something I want you to keep in mind as you go through this series.

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In the initial post in the series I wrote about establishing a large repertoire of impromptu tricks by adding a new trick to your mental file every week for the next year. If you're playing along, you should have about 10 tricks right now that you are rehearsing regularly and would feel comfortable sliding into if the opportunity presented itself.

The next step is to look at the items you carry everyday or could conceivably choose to carry and catalog the ones that can be used in an effect. If you're carrying something anyway, there's no reason not to have an effect or two you can do with it. I'm not talking about having a wallet full of packet tricks or a pocketful of gimmicked coins. This is just about being smart about utilizing the things you would have on you anyway. The purpose of this is not so you can go into a 20-trick long show just with the items in your pockets. The purpose is that by having a number of tricks ready to go at all time you will find yourself with many more opportunities to organically get into a trick. And this goes towards what I mentioned above about making things seem less like a "performance" and avoiding the weirdness associated with that.

If we're hanging out and you say, "I keep losing my keys," I can effortlessly slide into an effect with keys, an effect where something appears on my key ring, an effect where things vanish and reappear, or an effect where your memory seems to be affected in some way. And I can get into those effects seemingly based on you bringing up the subject. All I need to say is, "Yeah, I hear that. You'll appreciate this..." And while you'll eventually realize it's a trick, it feels natural because you were the one who brought up the subject. 

If I don't have a broad range of effects to pull from then you can say, "I keep losing my keys," and I have to follow it up with, "Did I tell you about the time I played 3 card monte in New York City?"

Another benefit to having a wide repertoire of effects with the items that you carry is that it puts a little psychological pressure on you in a way. You're going to feel dumb walking around with a headful of tricks that you're constantly prepared for and never actually doing any.

So take a look at the items below, see which ones you carry with you everyday, and learn a trick you can do with it.

• Wallet
• Coins
• Bills
• Credit Cards
• Business Cards/Loyalty Cards
• Drivers license
• Watch
• Ring
• Necklace
• Bracelet
• Shoelaces
• Phone and it's component features
  1. Phone
  2. Calendar
  3. Web browser
  4. Audio recorder
  5. Camera
  6. Video recorder
  7. Calculator
  8. Timer/Stopwatch
  9. Flashlight
  10. Maps
  11. Music Player
• Glasses/Sunglasses
• Jackknife
• Keys
• Keychain
• Lighter
• Cigarettes
• Mints
• Gum
• A small notebook
• A condom
• Chapstick
• A hat
• Rubber bands (I think even the Pope or Warren Buffett could have two or three rubber bands on their wrist and no one would question it. Just don't go full Joe Rindfleisch. Then it becomes a situation where you're clearly looking to go around doing rubber band tricks. Not a good look.)

Now, this is all about outer preparation. You've got a utility belt, like Batman, except it's invisible to those around you and is composed of everyday objects that you can go into numerous effects with when you're seemingly "unprepared."

The final step in this post is about inner preparation. I think it's valuable for everyone, but especially for people who don't perform much because they get anxious when they do. You need to imagine approaching people with a different mindset than you may have considered in the past. You can't think, "I'm going to fool this person," or, "I'm going to impress this person with this trick." You can't even think, "I'm going to entertain this person," or, "I'm going to give this person the gift of magic." These are things you can't control. Your mindset should be, "I'm going to perform this trick the best I can because I'm curious to see how this person will react to it." Your goal isn't to evoke something from them, you're just collecting reactions. There is no failure in this activity. Even if you mess up the trick you still get to observe their reaction. "They noticed when I dropped the palmed coin," is still a valid observation. The benefit of this is it will free you from getting hung up on needing a particular reaction and worrying if you are or aren't getting it.

Gardyloo #6

I don't generally check the metrics of this site. I could not be less concerned about the numbers. As Austin Kleon writes in his book, Show Your Work:

And the metrics only measure eyeballs, not hearts. 

One of the few metrics I used to like to read on my old site was what search terms led people to the site. Not because I wanted to optimize SEO or any of that nonsense. It was just funny.

These days it seems like you can't see what search query people used to get to your site. I think (correct me if I'm wrong). If I look in the metrics it will say "(not provided)" for most of the search-engine generated traffic to this site. Only maybe 1 in 100 times will it tell me what people actually searched for (and I don't really know why it does when it does). 

And that's unfortunate because the search queries that do get reported are outstanding. Let's take a look at the most recent figures...

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Happy to see "audience-centered magic" get its own tag on BoingBoing.

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Mini-Book Update: Just finished the new write-up for the oldest effect in the book, Pale Horse and Rider. This adds two phases to a Michael Weber idea that involves the use of a hand-drawn Ouija board. It may have been the trick that convinced me that a more unbelievable presentation is significantly more interesting to the spectator than the standard mentalism presentation. And that shifting the power away from yourself draws people in.

Also, it's a routine that, if you play it seriously, has a moment that can cause people to pee their pants a little.

---

A reader emailed me to suggest that introducing a deck of cards into the Time Traveler's Toilet, made the whole thing seem like just a magic trick. He's right, but that isn't my concern for that particular trick. As I wrote to him:

When a trick is overtly stupid and silly, I'm not concerned with everything being 100% rational. 

In most of the tricks I like, the gift you're giving the audience is the feeling of something incredible happening and it seeming real in that moment. And in those cases you don't want to do anything that detracts from the reality you're establishing. 

But when you say, "I have a toilet where anything you flush goes back in time," there is no way to make that feel real in any respect. They know from the get-go that everything is a trick. So now realism takes a back seat and I just want to do the strongest trick I can given the circumstances. I did consider a more "organic" solution (flipping through a magazine, letting a subscription card fall out, and doing it with a torn and restored subscription card) but it's not as fooling. And in this effect what makes it good is the dichotomy between the strength of the trick and the stupidity of the trick.

The Time Traveler's Toilet

This is sort of a bookend piece to go along with my last post. That post dealt with a trick that occurred on the edge of the majestic ocean. It's a conceptually beautiful trick, but one most of you will never do. I know my audience. I think this dumb little trick at the other end of the sewage system might be more your speed.

Imagine

Your friend is over to watch a movie or something. You excuse yourself to go to the bathroom. You come back a few minutes later nonchalantly eating a soaking wet cupcake, your eyes on the tv. Your friend stares at you gnawing on this sloppy cupcake. You notice him looking, give him a head nod, say, "Whattup?" and take a big bite as cupcake juice drips down your chin.

"What the fuck is that?" your friend asks.

"Huh? Oh this? Cupcake. Wait... didn't I tell you about my toilet? I thought... hmm.... no... maybe that was Toby. Here I'll show you."

You take him into the bathroom and lift up the cover of the toilet tank. "Looks normal, right?" He agrees. "Yeah, but check this out. Hmm... do you have to take a shit or anything? Actually, I know what will work." 

You go get a deck of cards, he chooses one, you give him the chance to change his mind. You have him fold the card in half and tear it, then in quarters, then in eighths. Then you have him drop the pieces in the toilet. "Wait," you say as you plunge your hand in the toilet, "hold onto this piece." Your friend goes full-on Steve Harvey, but you just ignore it, jab the piece in his pocket and press on.

You flush the torn card away.

"Check it out. A couple weeks ago I drop a deuce in this toilet, and when I go to flush it, I notice it doesn't flush properly; the water keeps running. So I look in the toilet tank and what do I see in there? A cupcake is preventing the flap from closing. But not just any cupcake. The exact same cupcake that I had eaten the day before. So I'm all, 'Sweet, free cupcake.' And scarf that thing down, the next day the same thing happens. The cupcake's back. And it's happened every day for like two weeks. I'll be honest, it's a little less good each time it goes through the cycle. Like a copy of a copy of a copy of a VHS tape. But it's definitely still edible. And it doesn't just happen with the cupcake. Everything I flush down this toilet goes back in time like 24 hours and appears in the tank. I swear on my child's life this is true."

"I'll show you. You chose a card. I gave you the chance to change your mind. You ripped it up. We flushed everything down except for one piece. Look in the tank."

And when he does, there is a mostly restored card floating there. It matches his selection and the missing piece fits perfectly.

Now it's time for you to go full Steve Harvey.

A little while later you ask him if he wants to order dinner. "If not, I'm brewing up a little eggplant parm from last night which should be ready in 45 minutes or so," you say and pat your belly.

Method

This is the type of trick that screams force unless you have a perfect force, which I happen to have with the Reverse Psychology Force.

Go into your bathroom with a Hostess cupcake and a duplicate of the card you're going to force. Take the card and rip off an eighth of the card; an index corner works best. Place the rest of the card so it's pinched between the toilet tank and the toilet lid. The picture below shows a slightly exposed view.

With the card in this position, you can lift off the cover and show the tank empty by holding the card up against the lid. And when you put it back you can let the card drop off into the tank, secretly loading it for the restoration/appearance.

Keep the torn corner in your pocket.

Take your Hostess cupcake and run it under the faucet until it soaks up a bunch of water. You're going to eat this. It's disgusting? Yes, I know it's disgusting. But it's just a wet cupcake, don't get all bent out of shape about it. Suffer for your art, for once.

Walk back into the other room eating your soggy cupcake. Wait for your friend to comment on it. Bring him into the bathroom to explain your amazing toilet. Lift the lid and show him the normal toilet tank. Replace the lid, letting the duplicate fall into the tank in the process. Go get a deck of cards. Force the matching card. Allow him to fold and tear up the card while you get the duplicate corner in finger palm. Let him dump the pieces in the toilet. Reach in and grab at the pieces, secretly bringing out the finger-palmed piece. If you're grossed out by this, clean your toilet bowl you fucking scumbag. Your fingers briefly touching clean water in a spotless toilet bowl shouldn't freak you out so much, Howie Mandel. Make your spectator take the piece you apparently plucked from the bowl. Flush the toilet. Allow your friend to lift the tank cover and discover the restored card and match up the missing piece. The End.

The Sweetness In Water

This trick was pulled from the forthcoming book for reasons of space. I didn't pull it because it was the weakest effect -- in fact it has one of the strongest visuals of anything I've ever done -- I pulled it because it has the biggest performing requirements: you have to be at the ocean and have something very specific with you to perform it.

I performed this last summer at my friend's beach house for about a dozen people who absolutely flipped their shit over it. It's a truly amazing effect that could not feel more organic, and it utilizes a secret that almost no one outside of magic knows about. 

Imagine

I'm at the beach with a group of friends. It's around 7pm, there are still a couple more hours of daylight and we're getting ready to eat some dinner. In reality I was probably wearing swim trunks and a t-shirt, but to emphasize how clean this trick is, and to feed your sick jerk-off fantasy-file, let's say I'm in a Speedo -- my thick manhood pulling the fabric taut against my buttocks. Does that do it for you, you creep?

Seriously though, this is a trick that legitimately can be done naked.

I asked a friend to grab me one of the kid's sand pails. She brought one over to me. I told the people that were around that I'd be right back, I just needed to rinse out the sand pail and get some ocean water for dinner. I walked out to the end of the dock, laid on my stomach, dipped the bucket in the water a few times to rinse it out and returned with a bucket full of water. 

At this point everyone was gathered around. I walked with the bucket and grabbed a red disposable cup off the picnic table. I poured some of the water from the bucket into the cup and then handed it to one of my friends. I told her she could keep take a sip of it if she wanted or just keep it for the moment. Unsurprisingly, she didn't want to drink any ocean water.

I was asked what I was doing. "Going to make Kool-Aid," I said.

I held the bucket out to another friend and asked him to swirl the water around and feel if there was anything in the bucket. There wasn't. It was just a bucket of water.

"You can't make Kool-Aid with saltwater; that's disgusting," someone said. 

"No," I said. "I'm going to take the salt out." Then, with 100% empty hands and no sleeves, I reach my right hand into the bucket, swirl the water a little, then pull my hand out in a fist. I extend both of my arms out, the bucket in my left hand, and out of my right hand begins to flow pure white salt.

I brush my hand off on my hip and say, "Hmm... that should do it."

I bring the pail back and hand it to my friend and ask him to take a sip. He does. It's fresh water.

My other friend who is holding the cup I filled from the bucket before I removed the salt takes a sip of her water and spits it out -- it's salty ocean water.

I then use the water from the bucket to make Kool-Aid. 

Method

Take Sands of the Desert. Remove everything Doug Henning about it. Take it off the stage. Do it with a borrowed vessel that's natural to the environment -- an ungimmicked bucket. Allow everything to be examined every step of the way. And do something that makes perfectly logical sense. Something you might actually do if you had these abilities.

The bucket isn't switched. The water isn't switched. You end completely clean. You don't need anyone other than yourself to pull it off. And it fools multiple senses, not just the eyes.

I love Sands of the Desert. It doesn't make any sense, really. You make a mess and then clean it up. It's only good in a theatrical context where you're free to do stuff that doesn't make any sense. But that moment where your empty hand reaches into liquid and pulls out bone-dry sand is perfect and fascinating to me. And that's why I developed this trick.

As per many versions of Sands of the Desert you will need waxed sand. But in this version you need it to be pure white. Waxed sand is sand that's coated in paraffin. You can clump it together into a ball and put it in water and it doesn't get wet. It's not the same a hydrophobic sand, which I don't believe clumps together in its dry state. I'm not sure where you can get it. I had someone make it for me. You might try here.

You also need a large plastic bag that you can put a gallon or so of water in. I used a couple plastic bags from the grocery store that you put produce in. I doubled them up to make them a little stronger.

As close to your performance as possible you fill the bag up with water, drop a large egg sized clump of the white waxed sand in there, then knot the top of the bag. 

There's one difficult part to this trick, but the difficult part is during the set-up, not the performance. You need to find somewhere out in the ocean where you can stash this load bag. I nailed the bag to the bottom of the dock (going through the top of the bag above the knot). Then when I went out to get the water I, loaded and unloaded the bucket a few times from the ocean water, and the last time I reached over the dock I pulled the bag off into the bucket, tore it open, and tossed the bag into the sea. [Edit: Some people are concerned about putting a produce bag in the ocean. Well, the good news is, in my case the ocean was a bro about this and secreted the bag away until later in the evening when it spit it back on the beach with perfect timing for me to dispose of. If you're concerned that might not happen, then you can shove the bag in your Speedo if -- unlike me-- you've got room.] My body and the dock covered these actions. But they were also covered by the fact that nothing had happened yet so people weren't overly suspicious. You go out towards the ocean with an empty bucket and come back with one filled with water and you don't have anything on you -- it makes sense that you got the water from the ocean.

So look for a place to stash the bag, at the end of a dock, behind a jetski, on a buoy, or wherever. When I first considered the idea I thought of attaching it to the ocean floor with a tent stake, but I didn't know if that would work. I think it might if you could keep track of where you put it. (You attach the bag in water about waist deep. You scoop the bucket in the water and pull up the stake releasing the bag into the bucket. You dump out any ocean water that's in the bucket, then break the bag releasing the fresh water and waxed sand load. Dispose of the bag. Do it all with your back towards the people on the beach. If that would work you could seemingly get a bucket of water from the ocean with nothing else around.)

You come back to the beach with a bucket of water. 

On the table is an opaque cup with a bunch of popcorn salt in the bottom of it. (Popcorn salt is very fine and dissolves quickly.) You poor some water from the bucket into the cup and give it to someone to hold onto. They are now holding salt water poured from the bucket. 

Then you swirl the water in the bucket with your right hand while your left hand supports it from the bottom. As you pull your right hand out, you slide the waxed sand ball up and against the side of the bucket. So now you're holding the bucket at the rim with your right hand and your right fingers are covering the sand ball, so the bucket looks empty other than the water and someone can reach into and feel around. Once they do you just go to swirl the water again and leave the sand ball back inside. You might think this is over-proving, and you may be right. It's a judgment call. I think at the very least you have to show the bucket only contains water at this point.

Look where we are. You got water from the ocean. You set some of it aside which anyone is free to taste. Someone has reached into the bucket and found nothing but water. And now you're in that same beautiful position from the original Sands of the Desert routine. With an absolutely empty hand you reach into the bucket. (Tip it towards them so they can really see your hand enter and exit the water). You come out with a handful of clearly dry "salt" that spills from your fingers. It's perfect. 

They can taste the water to see that it's now fresh. If someone wants they can taste the sample that was set aside and find that it really is saltwater. And then you make some Kool-Aid. (I actually came up with a way to de-Kool-Aid the water too, but it's overkill.) 

Book Update

I haven't been providing daily updates on the book status recently not because I've fallen off the pace, but because I've actually been very much on top of things and haven't needed the procedure of making daily updates to keep me on track. 

The illustrations are rolling in and look amazing; a couple of the included props are being created as I write this; the iphone app is on schedule; I've received permission from Simon Aronson and John Bannon to explain some of their concepts that I've built on in the book. There are 10-12 brand new effects, including some of my most practical impromptu routines I've done 100s of times, as well as some more unusual effects -- like one that takes all night to perform (most of it happening while your spectator is asleep), and one where a thought of meal appears in your oven. The book itself is used as a prop in a couple of effects, including one where you hand the book to someone, they read a few pages that guide them along a mental procedure until they're imagining something, and then that idea in their mind, an illustration in the book, and reality all overlap in this weird way for what I think will be a pretty amazing climax. 

When will it be ready? As originally proposed, it should be somewhere around the year anniversary of this site (in May), give or take a little bit. I'm taking my time with it to make it the best magic book you own. So I'm not rushing it, but it's on track. It will be released -- like everything I do -- when I can answer yes to these questions:

Those are the questions that guide my life.

The Wizard's Staff

It's the 1980s.

Michael Jackson is the King of Pop.

The nation is enthralled with a show called Alf.

Girls everywhere are using Get In Shape Girl so their T-Shirt Clips aren't too tight.

Everyone is trading their Garbage Pail Kids for a Gremlin's themed Rubik's Cube that came free with the purchase of a Mc.D.L.T., so they can keep their brains sharp for their appearance on Double Dare.

And the world is buzzing about a "totally tubular" new disease called AIDS.

I'm a little kid at the time and one of the magic tricks I really think is cool is called Mr. Wizard. It's a telephone trick where your spectator chooses a card and then you call a third party and that person names the card. This seems wildly clever to me.

They way it worked is that you would have a person select a card openly (so you know what it is too). Then you'd call your friend who was playing the role of Mr. Wizard. It's the 80s so this is on a landline phone. Your friend answers the phone and you say, "Hello, can I speak to Mr. Wizard?" And your friend, knowing that the trick is on, starts counting off the values of playing cards, "Ace... two... three...." When he gets to the value of the chosen card you interrupt and say something like, "Yes, I'll hold," or whatever. Now your friend knows the value so he starts going through the suits, "Clubs... hearts...." and again you interrupt after he says the suit of the chosen card. So you say something like, "Hi, Mr. Wizard, my friend would like to talk to you." Now you hand the phone to your spectator and Mr. Wizard can tell them the card they're thinking of.

Here's another write-up of the effect that might be clearer if you're unfamiliar with it.

And here's a write-up by an imbecile who completely doesn't get it. He forces a card on the spectator and then still codes it to the Wizard. Dingbat.

I would run through this code with a friend of mine and think it was so great that now we could just call each other whenever we wanted and perform this trick for someone. Inevitably, this is how it would go:

Me: [into the phone] Yes, could I speak with Mr. Wizard please?
My Friend: Huh? You have the wrong numb- oh wait... now... what do I do? Clubs... no... ace... is it suits or values first?
Me: Oh, he's not home? Thanks anyway. [hang up]

As time passed I eventually found a small group of people I could pull this off with fairly regularly. Although, most often, I was in the role of Mr. Wizard, just because I'm competent and could quickly transition into it instead of fucking it up like most of my friends did.

As an adult I would screw around with my friends when they'd call. I'd ask the person they were performing it for to concentrate as hard as they could and send me the image of what they were thinking of and then I'd say that I was just getting an image of large cock and that's all I was receiving. I enjoyed this because I'm a child and the thought of a mindreader trying to read anyone's mind (man or woman, straight or gay) and just being bombarded with images of dicks is funny to me.

Eventually this joke version transitioned into a new way of performing the trick.

The Wizard's Staff

This version is done all on speakerphone, so your audience hears both sides of the conversation. In fact, they place the call and do all the talking. You yourself only have to say one half-sentence to code any one of 52 playing cards. And even though the code is done in the open it only takes 30 seconds to learn.

I think the trick is much better with a marked deck. When you have a card freely-chosen and you apparently don't know what it is -- the fact that card can be named by someone on the other end of the phone is genuinely amazing. Even when it's performed as stupidly as I'm about to suggest. 

Here's how it goes...

You put a folded piece of paper on the table and say you'll get to that later.

You show a deck of cards to your spectator, have them shuffle it as much as they want and slide out a card and take a peek at it while you turn away. If they want they can change their mind for a different card.

Once they've settled on a card you say, "I don't even want to know what it is. I want you to take that piece of paper, open it up, and dial the phone number that's on there and put your phone on speaker. It's my friend, Mr. Wizard's number." Or make up a less stupid sounding name. "I want you to call him, tell him you're here with me and your thinking of something. Don't give him any more clues. Then just concentrate on your card."

Your friend calls Mr. Wizard, explains what's going on. Mr. Wizard attempts to read their mind, is besieged with mental images of penises, and then you interrupt and he eventually names the card. 

Here's how the code works. Mr. Wizard will make, potentially, four statements about how he's getting nothing but wang from this person's mind. So those statements might be:

Statement 1:
"Yes, my child, please concentrate on your secret thought and send it to me now. It's... uhm... hmmm.... okay, I'm getting something very prominently. I'm not sure if this is what I'm supposed to be getting, but your mind is totally focused on it to the exclusion of all other thoughts. Are you thinking of penises? I'm just getting an endless parade of dangling dongs. Just on and on."

Statement 2:
"No. There must be something else. Let me concentrate. It's black. It's a ten. It's a ten inch black cock? That's all I'm getting. But I'm getting it so intensely. It's like it's there in the room with you."

Statement 3:
"I'm sorry. This is very difficult for me. Let me try again. Let's try to get on the same page. Think of an apple? Ok, good, I got that. Now think of a lemon. Ok, that's coming through. Now a banana. Perfect, I got that... oh no... come on now. Bananas don't have big pendulous testicles attached to them. This is unbelievable."

Statement 4:
"Okay, last time. Let's really try and connect here. Send me what you're thinking about. Okay... I think I see something. Yes.... yes... keep sending it. It's coming. Yes, it's coming... coming cables of pearly white jizz. It's a goddamn sticky mess. You truly have a one track mind."

Those are just examples. The idea is that Mr. Wizard will make up to four statements. And depending on when you interrupt him, that will signal the suit. It's in CHaSeD order. So if you interrupt his first statement, it's a club -- second statement, it's a heart and so on.

What you say when you interrupt will code the value.

The code is this:

"uhmmmmm" = 1
"okay" = 2
"enough" = 8

Very easy to remember. Uhm is 1 syllable. Okay is 2 syllables. And "Eight is Enough" is a shitty old tv show.

So if you wanted to code the 3 of hearts. You would interrupt Mr. Wizard's second penis-related ramble with an annoyed, "Uhmmm, okay."

Other examples. All of these are said in a dismissive and exasperated tone as if to say, "Stop, this is going too far."

Ace: "uhmmmm..." (then I would gesture to my spectator to say something.)
Two: Okay
Three: "Uhmmm okay"
Four: "Okay, okay."
Five: "Uhmm, okay, okay."
Six: "Okay, okay, okay."
Seven: "Uhmm, okay, okay, okay"
Eight: "Enough"
Nine: "Uhmm... enough."
Ten: "Okay. Enough."
Jack: "Uhmm, okay. Enough."
Queen: "Okay, okay. Enough."
King: "Uhmm, okay, okay. enough"

These things don't have to be memorized. You just make them up on the fly once you know what the card is. You can include other words in what you say, but your "Wizard" friend is only listening for the code words. So if you interrupt his third statement by saying, "Uhm, that's quite enough." He knows that it's a spade (third statement) and a nine (uhm + enough).

At this point, Mr. Wizard will say something like, "I'm sorry. That's my fault. Sometimes, when someone loves something more than anything else in the world, like you do cock, it prevents me from seeing what's in your mind because I'm so overwhelmed by what's in your heart. Let's try one last time. Yes... I think I see it now... you're thinking of the nine of spades. Yes, I think it's the nine of spade. Or.... that could be a really weird looking dick. I just don't know."

You can make the trick less filthy by having Mr. Wizard ramble on about something else. He could just start going on about different episodes of Saved by the Bell or his obsession with the WNBA. The only essential idea here is the code which can be done with any motivated interruption on your part. 

Or you can go the other way and make it seem like the person whose mind is being read has much sicker, more deviant, thoughts going on in there than just a gaggle of dicks.