December 2009
President's Message
INSIDE THIS ISSUE A message from your President Master Payne
1 Upcoming Meetings Greetings,
Secretary's Message I hope everyone had a happy and fulfilling holiday and that you
2 found a joyous box full of magic under the tree. For the workers in
3 December 2009 Meeting our club I hope your holiday gigs were good and plentiful and that
all the checks cleared.
4 President's Message
For those who have been out of the loop for the last couple of
5 Magic Review months (see there is a good reason to go to the monthly meeting)
I am the new club president.
6 Upcoming Events
“How did this happen? I never voted for you?” I hear you ask.
Well through a series of unfortunate events I was thrust into the
position due to the ever shifting vagaries of a previous candidate
for the office. In other words the guy you voted for changed his
Secretary's Message mind and no one else stepped forward to take the reins of power
so you got stuck with me.
Greetings from your new The good news, it’s only for a year as I’m sure my reign as
secretary, Craig Colombel. This presidency will be more than enough motivation to have someone
newsletter is late this month as I more qualified to step forward and lead this club onward into the
am just getting into the first unquestionably numbered decade of the new millennium.
secretary role. I am planning to Anyway, I’ve got some fun things planned and I’m hoping to get
try to get the newsletter no through this year without causing too much damage. Actually
that’s a lie. I really haven’t anything planned as of yet. But I’m sure
latter than two weeks after the
I will come up with something. So really right now I’m open for
meeting. I am planning to have suggestions. So, if there’s something you’d like to see occur at our
an updated calendar of events meetings that presently isn’t happening drop me a line at
and guest articles from member
[email protected] and I’ll see what I can do.
of the Ring. Also I may be able I want this to be the best year ever for our club! A year full of fun,
to prevail on our President to friendship and other trite and meaningless sayings put in simply
contribute something. This as filler knowing few, if any of you have read this far down.
newsletter will be posted on the Our next meeting is the 14th and the theme is “What I got for
website and when I get a list of Xmas”. I want everyone to bring something they got during the
email address, will be sent to holiday and show it to everyone. It doesn’t have to be a trick, nor
the membership by email. If you do you have to perform. You just need to bring something to show
know of any magic events or and share and help me fill time.
performances or are performing Looking forward to seeing everyone at the meeting, don’t forget
our Holiday Party on the 24the as well!
yourself let me know and I will
place it into the newsletter. See you soon
Payne
Northwest Ring of Fire Newsletter Page 1
December 2009 Meeting:
The outgoing president Brian Cook open the meeting and then turn it over to the incoming president
Payne. The members were reminded that there is a club library and that they should take advantage of it.
The treasure reported that the club had enough money for the Christmas party. Which according to the
club's traditions will be held in January.
The Christmas party will be held at Shawn O.Donnald pub and restaurant on January 24th. The party will
start at 4pm and go until 7pm. Please do not show up early. There will be entertainment the performer /s
will be a surprise. Come and find out.
We had three first time visitors.
Ralph reported on the members who performed at the Lynnwood tree lighting ceremony. For those who do
not know every year, the club members perform for the people standing in line to see Santa Claus at the
Tree Lighting. This is how we repay the city for the use of the meeting space at the firehouse.
Pictures from the tree lighting can be seen at http://www.magickhappens.com .
The members were reminded again that this is a performing ring and the club is a place to practice and to
make mistakes and to get experience. So try to bring something you are working on or want to become
better at to the meeting and perform. Remember the clubs' motto is “This may or may not work”
Rich informed everyone that the option of buying a jacket with the club's name and logo on it was available
again.
Performances:
Payne gave a demonstration of a trick that he was reviewing for MUM magazine. It was a card trick called
“Up the Ante” Later during the meeting he performed another card trick that was a prediction using a red
deck and blue deck and a 2 pad notebook.
Ralph- gifted us with another installment of his series of lectures on how to make your magic better. This
time it was about how to design routines. He talked about don't worry about the details at first but work on
the who, what,why and when of the routine. Don't worry so much at first about the how, work on the
character, action, plot and climax. Start with the climax in mind and work backwards to beginning. If you
want to know more come to the next meeting for his next installment.
Jeff Dial performed a seasonal routine using 7 boxes decorated as gifts and 7 cards with name of children
on them. A member of the audience was to pick correctly which gifts were for the 6 “nice” children and
which gift was for the 1 'Naughty” child.
Philiman did a mentalism routine using credit cards, with three members of the audience using the cards to
go on a shopping trip and predicting the total costs of the items.
Craig Colombel perform a routine in which a Christmas stocking was first demonstrated to be empty and
then with the help of the imagination of an audience member produced a Christmas ornament(a star).
After
After the performances the meeting was adjourned and those that wanted to went to Maddox's for
refreshments.
Northwest Ring of Fire Newsletter Page 2
Magic Reviews
Payne has graciously donated some reviews of magic, he did for MUM Magazine. I will print one or two per
newsletter issue.
A Knight’s Tour With Free Choice of Start and End
E-Book by Chris Wasshuber
Available from Lybrary.com
http://www.lybrary.com/knights-tour-with-free-choice-start-p-5886.html
Price $25.00
A Knight’s Tour is an ancient mathematical problem in which a chessman knight is moved, according to the
rules of chess, around an empty chess board so that it lands on each of the sixty-four squares only once. For
centuries it has been a popular conundrum among mathematicians and chess addicts alike and has, in recent
times, appeared sporadically as a mental feat in the acts of magicians and mind readers.
There are two types of tours. Open and closed. A closed tour is one in which the knights final resting place is
in a position where it could capture its starting square. An open tour is one where this is not the case. Mr.
Wasshuber has developed a method which allows the performer not only to present both types of tours but
also to successfully create one in which the spectator has freely chosen both the starting and ending squares,
as long as they are of opposing colors -- ending on the same color square as one starts is as mathematically
impossible as trisecting an angle or rounding a square.
It is a slim E-Book comprising just 17 pages but it is clearly and concisely written with all the necessary
diagrams one would need to learn this version of a knight’s tour. There are no presentation ideas nor tips put
forth in the manuscript leaving it entirely to the reader to develop for themselves an act where a knight is
moved about a chessboard in an entertaining and engaging way.
Be warned, this is not a magic trick. It’s not even a trick. It’s a true and unadulterated feat. Mr. Wasshuber has
developed a matrix that allows the performer to work out in their head a unique Knight’s Tour where the
spectator chooses the start and stopping square. Thus this is not something you can pick up on Friday
afternoon with the expectation that you can put it in your show on Saturday night. Unless of course the
Saturday night you are thinking of is several months from now.
For most of us mere mortals this display of mental agility is going to require a huge amount of memorization
and practice. One needs to be able to visualize and hold in their mind the image of a quartered and seemingly
random numbered chessboard as well as the path that the knight needs to make on it this time around. No
mean feat as it is journey is different every time you do it. So if you suffer from numerophobia or your little
gray cells aren’t as nimble as they used to be you may find all this to be a daunting, if not completely
insurmountable task. However if you’re the kind of person who can work out the permutations of a memorized
deck after it’s been faro shuffled eight times this manuscript might be just be right up your alley.
Payne
Upcoming Events: See the Web site for more info: http://www.nwringoffire.com/index
January 11- Magic Monday
January 14 – Ring of Fire Meeting
January 24 – Ring of Fire Christmas/New Years Celebration
February 6 – Rafael Benatar Lecture
.
Northwest Ring of Fire Newsletter Page 3
