Salt and Pepper Suspension
This is a very simple impromptu throw away effect for a walk around performer. The effect is very simple, you borrow a dollar bill, a salt and pepper shaker, and perform a suspension effect right at a tables edge. As I said This is played as a quick throw away but in the right place at the right time it can be fun.
Look at a spectator and say do you have a bill I may borrow, while you are looking classic palm a quarter in your right hand. When a person offers up a bill fold it in half the long way. Open it partially and ask someone to pass you the salt and pepper shaker, this will give you an opportunity to load the quarter behind the bill. It should be loaded on the side of the bill that is convex from the fold. Lay the bill across the top of the salt and pepper shaker, the illustration above shows the audience point of view. When you lay the bill down the quarter will go right over the top of the salt shaker the illustration below shows this from a performers view. You begin to slide the shaker over that does not have the quarter on it, this will leave the bill suspended due to the weight of the quarter. You will also note from the photos that the folded bill also acts as a screen so the coin is not seen from the front.
I often perform this for a family and then teach a kid at the table how to do it, it is not an overtly amazing trick but for a kid it is a super effect. There have been times I have done this and all the planet must be aligned right and someone will say to me; your show was really good but that bill thing you did was amazing. I could not help but scratch my head, but there is no accounting for taste in effect.....?