SAM Assembly #206 December 2023 Meeting

The meeting opened with the election and installation of officers for the coming year. John Carter was elected by unanimous decision as the new President of Assembly #206 with Joe Weaver being elected to the office of Vice President. Jackson B. Edwards became the new Secretary with Tammy Dietz remaining in the role of Treasurer and Bertil Fredstrom was elected to the office of Sergeant At Arms. With the torch being passed to John, Adam became the Immediate Past President of the Assembly.

With the formalities concluded the meeting moved onto performances from the members. Adam opened the performances with a Harry Potter themed card trick incorporating a self opening book that revealed decks of cards from each of the four houses, House Gryffindor was selected and an intruder card from House Slytherin was shown to have invaded the deck.

Kent Cummins followed Adam with a mathematical mentalism trick that had members scratching their heads and checking their calculators when randomly selected numbers combined to show his prediction.

After multiple introductions from Paprika Leaverton, Bertil aka Black Bert, took the stage for a humorous escape routine ending with the spectator missing their watch, which somehow ended up in the hands of Bert. Jody Robbins, visiting from SAM #052, the Brother John Hammon Assembly in San Antonio, presented his version of the classic Chicago Opener.

Gary Yorke then brought out his laundry basket of socks and after letting multiple members of the audience select what went back in the hamper and what stayed he revealed that those were the matches of the socks he had been wearing all night.

Next up, visiting President Curt Parsons from San Antonio performed a card trick where the selected card vanished from the deck only to be found in his pocket. The kicker was that it was the only card that could have been selected since the rest of the deck was revealed to be blank.

Paprika then showed off how water can defy gravity by inverting a glass of freshly filled water that remained suspended until she broke the spell and poured it into second glass. Tim Dietz continued with the water theme by instantly changing a glass of water into red wine which he promptly drank.

Peter the Adequate ended the performances by having a card selected and then impossibly catching it from the air as the deck was tossed to him from across the room.

The party ended with all members present drawing numbers and selecting from a table of tricks, books and videos to take home as a holiday gift. We hope that more magicians from the Austin area (or even those who happen to be in town) can join us in the new year. Please keep an eye on this site for information on upcoming meetings.