954: Jay Alexander - San Francisco Treat

Jay Alexander is a mentalist who operates and performs at the San Francisco Magic Theater. More than just a mentalist, Jay performs across the country and even entertains as half-time entertainment at major sporting events. He has been a resident of San Fran since 1986 and has seen it go through a lot of changes, including Earthquake McGoon’s where a trove of Carter posters was unearthed.

Jay has a lot of great advice for performers and mentalists in this episode. Having an expansive background in mentalism, he has “cracked the code” to make mentalism seen, heard, and entertaining in the loud environment of basketball stadiums. He shares ideas with us this week along with stories about his theater and Earthquake McGoon’s.

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748: Alex Ramon - Part Two - Cold Shock

Cold Shock is an actual physical response that often results in death. It is a series of neurogenic cardio-respiratory responses caused by sudden immersion in cold water. In cold water immersions, such as by falling through thin ice, people will often quickly inhale which results in drowning by inhaling water.

We pick up this week with the second and final episode of our series with Alex Ramon where he talks about his “brush with death” by performing a live, online underwater escape from Lake Tahoe. He goes through his entire mindset from start to end and discusses all the many, many hurdles he had to overcome to do this extreme stunt.

Alex talks about not only his preparation for this stunt, but the many stories leading up to why he did this stunt and his daily training to drop in under freezing water. Imagine your fingers going numb so fast that you can hardly feel the lock pick in your hand to unlock the lock. Alex also gives additional advice on how to work with your fan base to increase your bottom line then talks about his future plans.

Download this podcast in an MP3 file by Clicking Here and then right click to save the file. You can also subscribe to the RSS feed by Clicking Here. You can download or listen to the podcast through Stitcher by Clicking Here or through FeedPress by Clicking Here or through Tunein.com by Clicking Here or through iHeart Radio by Clicking Here..If you have a Spotify account, then you can also hear us through that app, too. You can also listen through your Amazon Alexa and Google Home devices. Remember, you can download it through the iTunes store, too. See the preview page by Clicking Here

398: Bill Palmer - Renaissance Man

Author, Creator, Musician, Magician, Collector, and Multi-Lingual "bon vivant" Bill Palmer is an all-around nice guy who is more than just a little knowledgeable on nearly every topic. Hence the reason that I refer to him as a Renaissance Man and not just from his 25 years of appearing as Merlin the Magician at the RenFest and Scarborough Faire. Bill was also the translator of German to English of magic books by Punx, Borodin and Ted Lesley. Many of you know Bill Palmer's name from being the owner and curator of the Cups and Balls Museum. And although he has relocated, he is still collecting and looking to display his collection in his new home.

On October 24, 2006, Bill Palmer gave us a tour of his Cups and Balls Museum. This video opens with a discussion of how Bill started his collection and how it grew.

Time stamps for this podcast:

00:05:35 - Bill Palmer gives us a mini-lecture about loving your audience, the development of his Merlin the Wizard character, his association with Ted Lesley and Punx, translatingmagic books from German to English, and more.

01:06:34 - As an addendum to our chat where Bill talks about his cups and balls collection and the status of where iti is now, plus insights on collecting in general.At the end of our discussion, Bill suggested an interesting book about collecting which was written in 1852. You can download a PDF copy of "Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions by Charles MacKay" by Clicking Here.

954: Jay Alexander - San Francisco Treat

748: Alex Ramon - Part Two - Cold Shock

398: Bill Palmer - Renaissance Man

The Magic Word