A friend of mine, the philosopher and magician David Abram, used to be the house magician at Alice’s Restaurant, in Massachusetts (made famous by the Arlo Guthrie song). Every night he passed around the tables; coins walked through his fingers, reappeared exactly where they shouldn’t, disappeared again, divided in two, vanished into nothing.
Alice’s restaurant started off as a small greasy spoon but after Arlo Guthrie released his song the establishment gained so much notoriety that it expanded and moved to the neighbouring town. In David’s words, “Alice had a ruby inlaid in one of her front teeth, and she was always kind and generous to me: ‘Hey magishun: How's tricks?’ she would ask each day upon first seeing me, to which I'd reply: ‘Just fine, Alice: What's cookin?’”
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Rick Jackofsky
