Magic Chuckle Time

Bizarro is brought to you today by Easy At-Home Magic.

I remember the first time I visited a magic shop. I was about 8-years-old and was brought there by my grandfather. My cousin and older sister were with us as I recall, and we each were allowed to pick out one “trick.” The funny thing is that I don’t remember the trick I bought because the one my sister bought was the one that ended up fascinating all of our relatives when we got back home. I vividly remember being so jealous that she had made a better choice than I had.

Her trick was a plastic box with a removable lid, like a gift box for earrings, only square on all sides. Inside was a cube with a different color on each side. The way it worked was to give the box to someone else and ask them to put the cube into it, remembering the color on top, then replace the lid and hand it back to the “magician,” in this case, my sister. She would then put the box behind her back, shake it a little so you could hear the cube clacking inside, say some of the suggested banter, bring it back out and hold it in front of her face staring into it intensely, then announce the color they had chosen. Then she’d whip off the lid of the box and show that she was correct. Every single time. Nobody could figure out how she was doing it and the adults were laughing and squealing with amazement. I was so envious of her sudden ability to confuse adults (whom I had presumed knew everything) that I never forgot it. Meanwhile, I had gotten the equivalent of “The Pig Trick.” This early emotional tragedy ruined my career in magic and that’s why I became a cartoonist. And also because I didn’t like math.

PREHISTARROS: Here’s a magical joke from 2000, when it seemed that all people were using email for was to forward incredibly lame jokes. 14 years later, people are still using email to forward terrible jokes, but also inaccurate political propaganda and “heart-warming,” patriotic photos of firefighters rescuing kittens and soldiers attaching a Christmas tree to a tank in Afghanistan.

What’s your least favorite thing to get in an email?

Don’t forget to download my new EP of non-comedy, from-the-heart, music. Available on iTunes, and also Amazon, and also other sites like that and also Spotify and other streaming services. It’s cheap and fun and an excellent way to pay me back in some tiny way for all the smiles I may have given you. Thanks!