POOF! The secrets have disappeared!

This is a guilty pleasure, but I loved watching last night's premiere of "Magic's Biggest Secrets Finally Revealed," shown locally on the My9 Network.

I ate the original series up a decade ago when the Masked Magician exposed some of the grandest magic tricks of the day on the FOX Network. Hence, I made sure to record this new reincarnation of the series last night.

I've long loved magic — both watching it and trying to perform small cards tricks and the like. I still remember going to a small magic show when I was like 5, attending it with my family at IBM in East Fishkill. To this day, I find myself glued to the TV when Criss Angel or David Blaine do something cool and newsworthy.

My senior year in college, I went to a David Copperfield show at Albany's then-Knickerbocker Arena — I'd seen all of his CBS prime-time specials as a kid — and was blown away at how, for example, he disappeared on stage and rematerialized seemingly from out of the floor directly behind my ninth-row seat!!! A dozen years later, I still have no idea how he did that one.

So ... when I have the chance (for the first time, 10 years ago) to see how they do all those amazing illusions, I was hooked! Now, with a new, 13-episode season showing how they do about 120 even better tricks, I'll be doing an illusion of my own: magically appearing in front of my TV for the next dozen Mondays to watch the show!

Now, I know many old-school magicians don't agree with revealing the secrets of the trade — a decade ago, the Masked Magician's motives were to inspire his brethren to come up with newer, more elaborate illusions — but I love the "duh factor," as I call it. I like being totally mesmerized by an illusion one minute, and learning how (many times) it's so simple to pull off, as if Duh! Why didn't I think of that?!

Nowadays, though, all you need is an Internet connection to learn the basics of the craft. Whereas I'd often take out magic books from the library when I was a kid, now I just log on to YouTube (many times, when I can't sleep) and learn card tricks and other beginner's tricks from 7- and 8-year-olds!