Week 3 - chapter 3, false cuts.

Its been a week since I last posted. Once a week is not bad, I was hoping for once a day though.

So chapter 2 was on the "overhand shiffle". I hate the overhand shuffle. Seriously. Let me say that again. I HATE the overhand shuffle. Does anyone even use it? Besides magicians? Has anyone ever sat in on a poker game where they shuffled that way? Maybe they use it for bridge, cribage, 52 pickup or maybe dice. I don't know. I have never once in my life seen it used by someone other than a magician. The one time it was not used in a magic effect I was playing a game of Magic the Gathering. The guy shuffling the deck was a magician. I had such high hopes after spending a week holding and spreading cards. The more I practiced it the more I realised I would never ever use this for anything. What draws me to magic is this : you can take a ordinary item and do something extrodinary with it. I like dice, cards, coins, rope, and anything you find in every day life. Sitting at a dinner table with friends? Make the salt shaker dissapear. Then pull a fork from a roll and make it levitate behind your hand. At the office? Shove a pencil in one ear and then pull it out your nose. Grab two rubberbands and link them. Use the little rubber page turner as a thumb tip. Link paperclips without useing your hands. Or better yet straiten one out and push it in your head like the old nail in the head illusion. The overhand shuffle is not normal. I am going to have to figure out a way to do the "spectator cuts to the aces" routine without a overhand shuffle. I like that effect. Just not the strange shuffle.

This week we work on false cuts. When I first started learning magic I was supprised at the obviousness of some of the moves. False cuts take the cake in obvious ballsy magic moves. They are incredibly open. So much so that they are initialy scary. Still to this day I get nervous using them. Here is what I mean. When you do a Swing cut you hold the deck in dealing position. Then you use your other hand to lift up the top half of your deck and swing it towards the palm holding the deck. This leaves the bottom half sticking out just a little. As your hand returns towards your side and passes over the deck. You take the bottom half in a end grip and swing it out and then bring it over the other half of the deck and drop it on top. It looks clean, nice and pretty. For a false cut version you do exactly the same thing up untill you grasp the bottom half in end grip. Instead of pulling it out and droping it on top you pull it out and tap its edge on the top of the top half to "square" it up. Then you drop it on the table. Reach back and take the top half in end grip turn and drop that on top of the rest of the deck. You want to watch your hands as you do it. But you can't. The more you look at the deck, the more your spectators will look at the deck. You have to talk to them as you do it. And you must look them in the eye as you "square up" the bottom part on the top part. You want them focused on you and distracted from the deck. Not entirely distracted. Just enough to cast doubt in the minds of everyone watching you. That pause while you "square up" the cards is enough to pull it off. You drop the bottom half on the table and and then the top half right back on top of the deck. Exactly where it had been at the start of the cut. Sounds easy? It is terrifying. As you do this blood rushed to your head. All you can hear is your heartbeat. Did you hold your breath? Did that give it away? What were you doing again? What comes next? Did you practice enough? What are my hands doing? Am I pausing? Should I be doing something? Is this a anxiety attack? I should say something. What should I say? Oh my god. I am loosing them. Say something. Do something. Move. Breath. Do something please. And you exhale. Glance at the cards. Realise that whole pannic attack took only one second. And move on. No one calls you on it. No one noticed it or the sweat that had started to bead on your forhead. It totally worked. Like lieing to your parents about getting another cookie while its still in your mouth. Or better yet. Like telling the guy standing next to you at the urinal that you are a woman. All while you smile and pee.

On the less boring side of things we have the Batman: Arkham Asylum game. I love this game. You feel like Batman. Killer croc is up next. I need to go to his section of the asylum and get a plant that grows there. Pretty much where he sleeps. And the guards dont go there. He is to dangerous. They just drop down food into the sewer section they keep him in and ignore him. He bit the hand off one of the guards. I am extited about it. It should be fun.

Other than that my girlfriend and I mannaged to get 3/4 of the way done with the live event in Warhammer: Age of reconing.

Has anyone played Champions Online with a Xbox 360 controller? It seems like that would be a better way to controll it.