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I received a curious text
message from my roommate last week:
“Want to go to the Magic Castle
with me and Stephanie?”
A cultured person not
unfamiliar with the infamous Masked Magician might read that and feel a thrill
of excitement for reasons I will expound upon in a minute.Me?I
thought the Magic Castle was a Disney-themed bounce house and while I have
seriously considered renting a bounce house with a few friends for an afternoon
(tell me that wouldn’t be the best afternoon of your life!), I was
confused.Why a bounce house?Why me?Why now?Would pizza be served?
Several days later she revealed
that the Magic Castle is a magician’s club and, as the people we were with at
the time of the unveiling confirmed, it is private and exclusive and everyone is dying to get an invite.Everyone except me because, let’s be honest,
I was mildly disappointed that the Magic Castle wasn’t a bounce house
emporium.I mean, I enjoy the old
quarter-found-behind-the-ear trick as much as the next person (as long as I get
to keep that quarter – Laundromat prices are going up) but magic is not
generally My Thing.Sometimes magic even
creeps me out a little bit; I think it’s a combination of the flamboyance of
traditional magic acts (see: those two dudes with the endangered cats) mixed
with all of the disappearing and reappearing and sawing people in half and
putting oneself in dangerous situations except, no, it’s okay because I can
pick locks!With my elbow!
My immediate concerns (What
does a girl wear to a private, exclusive magician’s club?Would the audience have to participate?Would pizza be served?) were ignored and
everyone encouraged me to take advantage of this once in a lifetime opportunity
to visit the Magic Castle.So I gave in
to the peer pressure and agreed to make an appearance at this SUPER EXCLUSIVE
magician’s club only to find out moments later that the dress code was as
follows:cocktail dresses, elegant skirt
and blouse combination or an evening pantsuit.Elegant skirt and blouse
combo?EVENING PANTSUIT?And then!Then, I read the men’s dress code only to find that jackets are required
unless the man is wearing a turtleneck, bolo tie, or JEWELED OR RUFFLED
COLLAR.Upon reading this, I wanted
nothing to do with the Magic Castle.Abort mission!
My roommate was mad that I
would pass up my chance to experience a super exclusive magic club because of
the dress code.She told me it was lame
to miss out just because I didn’t want to invest in an evening pantsuit and
associate with men dressed in jeweled and ruffled collars.I told her the bolo ties were offensive,
too.She shouted, “I can’t believe you
would say no to a super exclusive magic club.I just want you to go to this super exclusive club.It’s super exclusive.”Up until this moment I hadn’t understood just
how exclusive this super exclusive club was.
Today she was busy texting and
suddenly exclaimed, “TWENTY FIVE DOLLARS for the Magic Castle?!”Faced with shopping for an elegant evening
pantsuit tomorrow I seized my opportunity and said, “That is too much money for
me!Twenty-five to get in, eight for
parking, fifty for a pantsuit.That’s
seventy-five dollars for entrance to this exclusive club.”
Math hasn’t always been a
strong subject for me.
But she got the hint.We will not be gracing the super exclusive
magic club with our presence on Saturday evening.
We will, however, be renting a
bounce house on March 21st for her birthday.
