Why am I stuck in magician Hell?

Let's talk about silks baby. Let's talk about you and me.

Discussing the use of silks and whatnot the other day with the person who is fourth down on my links list. Someone once told me that silks and the like are only a magicians prop now and they don't make sense. This made sense to me. As a society we no longer cart around hankies and silk scarves on a daily basis. Once again, equipment leftover from a forgotten time. How can we as an entertainment art move forward if we keep living in the past?

I can understand the use of silks or cloth for certain things, don't get me wrong. (Mind you, without silk magic Duane Laughlin would be out of a job.) Silks were very popular with Chinese magicians cuz' the Chinese actually made things from silk. Magicians use them cuz' they compress right nice and often sport colors not found in nature. Fuscia.. I mean really?

Ok so let's talk about a very popular item in magic. It makes NO sense, is easy to make yet expensive, and a bitch to reset. The Silk Fountain. Yes that little eruption of colors that never seems to end. The BEST use of one I have seen is by a girl named Yumi from Japan. Her act is floral themed (Card manipulation petals, etc) and her silk fountain fades from white o pink and becomes what effectively looks like a big ass flower bouquet. (in comic book guy voice) Best... silk fountain.. evar!

So, silks... useless cloth or dated magic prop? You decide.

Bizzaro.