John Rogers Blog

John's latest Stage Show

John challenged the audience of 200 people to read and remember what was written on both side of the sign he was holding.

By asking them to remember what the signs say, their attention was distracted from noticing the mistake on both sides of the sign.

Over 75% of the audience did not read the sign correctly.

Posted Monday April 30, 2012

New Cigar Workshop:

Well it is just about finished. Hard wood floor must be put down as soon as weather permits. I along with my best friend Don Johnson built the workshop this past summer. Don and I have built foot bridges, crib walls, office walkways and now a workshop. I Thank the great magician in the sky for a friend like Don Johnson!

No plans - Copied it from memory to look like a cabin in Colorado. The workshop is right outside my cabin. The lake can be seen when looking out of the picture window on the side. (It doesn't show in the photo.) The woods comes right up to the cabin and workshop. I like it that way. No grass to mow and no leaves to rake! The gravel from my 3 car wide parking space comes right up to the porch. The 30 foot walk from the cabin to the workshop is mud free on the gravel! No concrete or asphalt on my 2 acres of heaven!

Posted on Feb. 21, 2012

Amusements Moved:

In a major move, I have decided to make my amusements public. Previously, I kept them hidden on a secret section of this website. I now supply a link to the amusement section. The link can be found on the "main pages' section on some pages of this site, but not all pages.

The amusement called Genie is for everybody and needs no explanation.

Two amusements challenge magicians to learn how they function. It is quite a challenge to figure out the secret. I do not reveal any workings on them.

Three effects are taught to aspiring magicians and are John's favorite creations. Visit the amusement section and see if there is anything amusing to you!

Posted on Feb. 14th, 2012

Photo Op

Send me a photo of you or a friend using one of my props and I may just put it on one of my web pages. I have two such photos up now!

Posted on Jan. 20th, 2012

JR1.US Shortcut:

Woodencigars.com has a new way to access these pages. Why is that important? Let me give you a little background on this website before I answer that question. Stay with me.

Woodencigars.com was registered on January 8th, 2001. That means I have been writing web pages for over 11 years. My pages have changed many times as I learned more and more about making web pages that work. All my knowledge has come from the Internet itself. I have learned from web designers who shared their knowledge freely here on the web. I learned that good web pages must conform to web standards. (Some very smart folks created the standards. Really!) Standards set the bar for guys like me to create web pages that function properly.

Checking pages against the standards is easy as many online tools exist for my use. Those tools can validate that a page conforms to the standards. Often online page analyzers suggested that my domain name of woodencigars.com was too long. Why is it too long?

The answer is simple. 11 years ago on January 8th (2001) when I registered my domain there was no need to have a short domain name. But as with all things, change happens!

Today there are 1.2 billion folks who access the web through hand held devices like Iphones, Ipods, Ipads and smartphones of the Android technology.

It is my belief that more and more folks will access the web from hand held devices. Smartphones are growing in popularity.

The tiny screens on hand held devices along with a tiny keyboard makes it desirable to have a short domain name that is easy to type. That is why I got suggestions that my domain name was too long.

I decided to NOT change my domain name. Instead I decided to purchase JR1.US domain name and have it automatically send folks to woodencigars.com. JR1.US is easily typed on a small hand held screen. You can type the URL of jr1.us or JR1.US and it will redirect to woodencigars.com. It is like Magic!

In addition, I decided to accomodate hand held devices by making my web pages shrink or grow to fit various screen dimensions. That ability is called fluid layout. All of my pages use fluid layout which means you can access my pages and buy my products from your hand held device. My pages shrink to fit the device. Not all web pages shrink or grow to fit various screen sizes. Many web pages are a jumbled mess when viewed on hand held devices.

I check my web pages on my Ipod to make sure the pages are correctly displayed. The links are hard to hit with my fat fingers but it is possible to purchase items from an Ipod. Try it!

In Conclusion:

WOODENCIGARS.COM 11th birthday was celebrated on January 8th, 2012! THANK YOU for supporting my props the past 11 years! The first 11 people to email me and ask for the JR1.US REWARD will receive a free postage paid gift to celebrate being 11 years old!