I never noticed before but... When you're doing the blowing away thing like the gif, aren't you supposed to open your fingers from the ones next to your face first? To give the illusion of blowing them out? Az does it the other way, from his pinky inwards towards his face. Not outwards.
He does it inwards... Because the trick is reeling in a kiss, "making the magic happen".
Crowley is doing the thing he likes best, standing around "carping", which is a fish, in the ocean, and all sea related things are sex metaphors between them. (That's a long read so let's summarize.)
Crowley's carping isn't him being mean. It's foreplay. He's literally begging Aziraphale. Get it? It's an iteration of the wall slam.
Carping about the magic act is Crowley's way of saying your magic is working on me and I want to ravish you.
"Retire" the magic act? You lay it to rest. To rest is to go to bed. To fuck around instead of working, which we know they're always doing, because they're NEVER working.
Also, one of Terry's famous wordplay quotes is about how elves are "terrible":
Elves are wonderful. They provoke wonder. Elves are marvellous. They cause marvels. Elves are fantastic. They create fantasies. Elves are glamorous. They project glamour. Elves are enchanting. They weave enchantment. Elves are terrific. They beget terror. The thing about words is that meanings can twist just like a snake, and if you want to find snakes look for them behind words that have changed their meaning. No one ever said elves are nice. Elves are bad.
Aziraphale is "terrible at magic"?
The etymology of terrible: late Middle English (in the sense ‘causing terror’): via French from Latin terribilis, from terrere ‘frighten’. Literally terrific, lol. Same idea Azirahpale used when describing Crowley as a "wily adversary" who "keeps me on my toes", and the same kind of wordplay as Crowley's "see a wile, ya thwart": wiles meaning sexually attractive, and the old meaning of "thwart" as to cross over--see a sexy demon, you jump ship and straddle him.
If you look up the definition of terrible, you get the common "extremely bad", but also these:
2 a : difficult in a terrible bind b : formidable in nature : awesome a terrible responsibility c : exciting extreme alarm or intense fear : terrifying 3 : extreme, great a terrible disappointment
Frankly, all three apply, excusing parts of speech: magic is difficult; he's awesome and formidable at it, and the way he does it is terrifying; he's also great at it.
What Crowley just said is that you're keeping me on my toes, shall we lay down about it? Aziraphale's answer: Probably for the best.
