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Tim has many, many sets of playing cards in his toy collection, and here he shows just some of the extraordinary decks he has acquired over the years.

Playing cards come in many sizes and shapes, and the first cards we see are much smaller than normal playing cards, followed by a deck that is so large that you need two hands to hold them!

Tim then shows cards from a 'crooked deck' where each card has been cut with sides that are crooked. Perfect for a crooked dealer, maybe! Then another set of cards has a slight curve at each end of the card. When you look at the back of the card, it is the shape of a beer can - these were a promotional item for a brewery!

Triangular cards, square cards and circular cards all follow in quick succession, and then a Japanese deck where the cards are the shapes of tenpin bowling pins. Very bizarre!

Tim then shows some artistic and pictorial sets of cards. First up is a set of cards produced in Israel, where the court cards are biblical characters, and the Black Pack shows African figures as court cards. We then see a deck with a Noah's Ark theme. Each ace shows the ark, and the cards all show different animals. The next deck shows a series of cartoons. Each suit has a sequence of drawings, that tell a story. Tim shows the diamonds, which have a kind of 'Rake's Progress' all done in cartoons - the man turns up at the marriage agency, meets a lady, they end up having more and more children, and eventually he dies of drink. Slightly dark as stories go. And each suit tells a different story. We then see a deck produced by Disney, where the court cards are Disney characters like Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse. And then a deck of cards where each card has been created by a different artist. It is often hard to tell what some of the cards represent!

Tim then shows some of his cards that show optical illusions and similar tricks. Some have a different optical illusion on each card. This is followed by an anamorphic deck of cards from France. You have to place a reflective cylinder on each card, in order to make sense of the picture.

Magicians sometimes use strange cards for a joke, so when you pick a card, you find you have chosen the 3½ of Clubs, or maybe the 15 of diamonds! Another magician's deck has a standard blue design on one side, and the standard red design on the other side. And that is it. here are no faces on the cards, just backs. Then Tim shows a deck of cards than can be fanned out to show the card values, but if you fan them out another way, you get a picture of a dragon. Tim does not claim to be an expert, but he has seen this particular trick demonstrated to great effect by a professional magician.

Tim then shows a deck of cards that has three games in one - normal cards, dominoes, or a spelling game; then there is a pack of cards for children that every so often has a funny instruction, like 'act like a dog' or 'make crazy movements'. The next deck has subtle mistakes on every card. Some mistakes are easier to spot than others.

The Queen's Slipper deck is nearly normal, except that each suit has an 11 and a 12, making 15 cards for each suit. Tim does not know how the game works, but apparently it is popular in Australia.

A Braille deck, then a deck where each card has a diagonal line on the face, with a different design and value on each half of the card. A transparent deck is shown, and then the so called 'indiscretion deck' where the backs of the cards show which suit the face of the card is, although they do not give away the value. There are all sorts of unusual games that can be played with this deck.

And finally the one that got away... 20 years ago, and American company produced the 'Jill' deck. Given that each suit has a King and Queen, which gives a balance between male and female, it seems maybe a little odd that you get the Jack (male) with no corresponding female. Hence the creation of the Jill deck. So each suit goes... 9, 10, Jack, Jill, Queen, King, Ace. Unfortunately Tim did not come across one of these sets of cards during the brief time they were available, and hence he does not have this set in his collection. The one that got away....