"For many years, I did close-up magic every Sunday at the leading hotel in my city. I enjoyed going from table to table, making jokes and interacting with the guests. However, there was one problem. Whenever I produced a deck of cards, people would ask me for a reading. Invariably, they would rather receive a card reading than see a trick in which the four aces miraculously appeared. I am not sure if they intuited my interest in divination, or if every close-up magician experiences this. Of course, once I read the cards at one table, the guests at the other tables also wanted a reading. In fact, the card readings were much more popular than the magic ever was."