What am I, Kreskin?

It’s one of my all-time-favorite expressions. Baby boomers drop it regularly: What am I, Kreskin? – to mean how the hell should I know? I can’t hear it without laughing out loud. Especially when my eldest sister says it.

And as a public service to you GenXers, Millennials and other interplanetary voyagers who missed terrestrial TV in the 1970s, here’s the etymology.

Back then, Kreskin’s bespectacled visage was practically everywhere. He never missed the chance for screen time. When he wasn’t on TV he was doing colleges and theaters and high schools and nightclubs and bar mitzvahs and God knows what else. The guy worked eight days a week.

Full stage name The Amazing Kreskin – I wonder if his friends call him “The” – George Kresge was one of the best and  most successful illusionists of the 20th century. The New Jersey native (Montclair) calls himself a “mentalist.” He specializes in creating tricks that make his audience believe he can read minds and project thoughts, that kind of thing. Sort of like David Blaine’s early work, but less creepy.

And all that TV exposure led to the expression. It’s a funnier and more unexpected way to say, “I’m not a mind reader.”

Old George is still around, still in Montclair. And a good friend of mine is a good friend of his manager. One Christmas, that connection got my buddy on Amazing’s Christmas list and he received a gift – a really nice leather-bound notebook, engraved with “With appreciation, Kreskin” or some such thing in gold letters.

As my buddy was proudly showing it to us, he said, “I can’t believe I got this. It’s so nice. I should send him a note to tell him how much I like it.”

To which my wife replied, “He already knows.”

ROFL.

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