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The Game of Pickleball! It seems like a fairly recent phenomenon the way it’s been sweeping the land by storm doesn’t it? It seems every community is building Pickleball courts at breakneck speeds but still can’t keep up with the demand! If you’re having trouble fighting the rabid crowds of pickleheads just to get on the courts and wish there was a way to enjoy the game at your own home, at your own kitchen table where you can wear your favorite pickle costume without being ridiculed, I just might have the answer you’ve been looking for! It’s the tabletop game of PICKLEBALL BLAST by Moose Games! And in this episode of the Dandy Fun House, I’m going to unbox this sweetly sour barrel of fun, show you how to assemble and play it, give my honest thoughts and also share the history of the game of pickleball! Time to pucker up and step into the Fun House!

Hello and welcome to the Dandy Fun House video show, podcast and blog! I’m your host Neil Dandy and this is where we scrape the bottom of the pickle barrel to bring you the juiciest retro pop culture, toys and games and all the fun stuff you can dill with!

Today I’ll be doing a full-on unboxing, assembly and review of the game PICKLEBALL BLAST while also bringing you the history of the game of pickleball.

BUT FIRST! I wanna marinate your cucumbers in a jar of these puckerrific DANDY FUN HOUSE T-SHIRTS! They might not come in a jar but they ARE crunchtastic and WILL make all your friends GREEN with envy! Manufactured by the briniest of sourpuss garment printers on the planet, everyone will instantly know that your taste is pure bread and butter. And I’m not just gherkin you around when I tell you that we also cut four specially designed holes in each tee for your comfort and practicality! One to climb your torso into, one to squeeze your head out of and two to poke your green little pimply arms through! Want one? Just head over to the Dandy Fun House website at www.dandyfunhouse.com to spin the lid off one of your own!

And while you’re there, check out our other amazing designs including our COFFEE BADGER tees, mugs and bags of harshly ground french roast! If you like to badge in, caffeinate and badge out, then the coffee badger is your roast!

Once again, head over to www.dandyfunhouse.com and get cranked up today!

Ok! THE GAME OF PICKLEBALL! Maybe you’re like me and you’re wondering what all this recent hubub is about surrounding this game with the weird name, Pickleball! I just started hearing about this a few years ago. Everyone buzzing about playing it, every community installing courts in every recreational facility and absolutely nobody would explain it to me. It’s like everyone else knew what this was and I had to figure it out on my own. So I went down to my local park and saw these weird little miniature tennis courts with people holding giant ping pong paddles whacking whiffle balls back and forth. And I said to myself… This is pickleball? Where’s the pickle? Why is it called pickleball? When did all this happen and why am I the only person they didn’t tell?

This prompted a bit of research on my part and I was very surprised to learn that while the current pickleball craze is a fairly new phenomenon, the actual game itself was invented in the 1960s! 1965 to be exact, on Bainbridge Island, Washington by a man named Joel Pritchard (who would one day go on to become a US Congressman as well as Washington’s Lietenant Governor) and his two friends Barney McCallum and Bill Bell. Together they devised the game and established the rules.

The name Pickleball is inspired by the pickle boat crew where the oarsmen were chosen from the leftovers of other boats. Whereas the game of pickleball is sort of an amalgamation of the court from badminton, the paddles from paddleball, a whiffle ball and the net height of tennis.

They decide to establish Pickle Ball Inc. to market the game, bring it to the masses and of course, sell the necessary equipment.

By the mid-70s, pickleball tournaments began springing up around the country and by the early 90’s became a feature of the Senior Olympics.

The Pickleball Hall of Fame opened in 2017 and two different professional tournaments became established in 2019.

In 2022 Pickleball became the official sport of the state of Washington, signed into law on the very court the sport was first devised.

DANDY FUN FACT! Did you know that the game of Pickleball even has it’s own tv channel? That’s right! PickleballTV is co-owned by the Tennis Channel and the United Pickleball Association. You can find it at pickleballtv.com as well as on a variety of streaming services.

Ok, I don’t really want to get into all the rules of Pickleball because that’s not really what we’re here for! What we ARE here for is to dig into this game of PICKLEBALL BLAST by Moose Games!

So here we have our box and we’re gonna have a good look at what we’re working with here! Good design here. It’s got a pickle flying through the air and it’s getting whacked by a paddle from a seated position and there’s these white things with flippy lids I think those are supposed to be pickle barrels. I think it’d be better if the white things kind of looked like pickle barrels but it says blast the pickle into the pickle jars. The pickle smackdown game! The hottest new paddle sport

Step one: blast the pickle! Two: slam the pickle jars! and Three: flip the lids to win! Alright. Well not much more to go on for the packaging. I really like the fact that they incorporated pickles into the packaging. That means a whole lot to me. But let’s go ahead and open this thing.

I’ve already popped the tape on it, but that’s all I’ve done So I haven’t personally had a look here.

And on the inside there’s a bunch of nothing to see. There is some printing on the inside. They did good with the packaging. They didn’t really cheap out on it. They’ve got the assembly instructions in the lid. We’ll look at that if we have to. This looks pretty straightforward though.

This must be the game field. Oh, we’re seeing the underside of the game field! So let’s have a look here And they’ve made it easy. Look the the pickle barrels are already mounted and the flippy lids Look at that. Okay. Okay. All right. All right, so there there’s not gonna be a whole lot of assembly here. We’re gonna get to the game plan pretty darn fast. This is going to be a pretty quick episode.

Okay, you got different colors on different sides and you flip the lids and you reveal the pickle image. And the court itself is a big pickle.

You shoot the pickle across you try to get it to land in one of the pickle jars and flip the lid. That’s pretty self-explanatory. So let’s see what we’ve got here… It’s a little cardboard spacer in there.

Okay, and We have our whack paddles and is That the(…) Pickle or is I don’t know what this thing is Oh, that’s the net and there’s something that waves back and forth and does it try to keep you from Doing what you’re supposed to do. I don’t know what the heck is okay So we got the net and there’s some kind of weight here and there’s something flying around the top… Oh… It’s the pickle!

Oh So the pickle doesn’t fly across the court on its own. You’re just not shooting a pickle. It’s actually tethered to a metal rod and there’s a weight at the bottom that makes it behave properly and kind of keeps everything in check. Okay, that’s that’s kind of cool. That’s kind of genius.

Okay Not really sure how that’s going together But now we’ve got to get our paddles separated out of here and there’s some other little thing like in white parchment paper So we’ll look at the instructions if we need to but in the meantime I’m gonna get these paddles out of here and I’m not really sure how(…) They’re supposed to .

The paddles have thumb flippy doos to operate the paddles with. Not really sure what’s going on there, but let’s open this parchment paper and see what we’ve got here…

We have these little clips which I guess have to be used to Keep the court together. They go underneath. Oh, we’ll start we’ll start underneath and see if it likes that. And I think these are just little scorekeepers and then you just hold the paddles with your hand. I really think that I think we got it here guys I think we’re ready to play some Pickleball Blast! I Don’t really think we need to read any instructions here. I think we’re pickleball blasting!

Look at that. I already already flipped a lid there…

So there are two images on the little flippy lids; One is a white one and it looks like the label from a barrel of pickles and when you hit it it flips it over to show the picture of the cartoon pickle going “ow I’ve been hit in my pickle head!”

(Neil continues to play)

How much how long can you do this and have fun with it? I really don’t know. I guess you’d really have to be playing with another person to determine it but okay, well, I mean that I don’t really know what else to tell you that’s pretty much the game of pickleball blast it’s

It’s a fun distraction, I mean look at this pickle…

It’s a fun concept.

Is this gonna be hours of fun? I don’t think so but was it fun to put on a pickle costume and tell you all about the game of pickleball while I Whack this thing around and do my thing? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it’s fun. You know kids will like it. They’ll have fun with it. Is it the greatest game I’ve ever reviewed? No Is it is it neat? Yeah, am I glad I got it and did this review? Yeah on a scale of one to ten pickle jars I’ve got to give this game of pickleball blast… Six and a half pickles!

And if you’d like to help keep ME from scraping the bottom of the financial pickle barrel, please consider supporting future productions of the Dandy Fun House by visiting our Patronage Page at www.dandyfunhouse.com

 

SUPPORTERS gain access to exclusive bonus features not available to the general population
and
SUPER SUPPORTERS get all that same stuff but I’ll also mail you something extra sour from right here at the Dandy Pickle Jar IF you provide your mailing address!

Podcast lIsteners may support via the donation button in your listening app of choice if provided

and 5 star reviews anywhere you can leave them always get my undying gratitude!

DUDE! Thanks for crunching with me and the game of PICKLEBALL BLAST today! Hope we DILL-Ivered the goods for you! Don’t forget to come on back real soon right here to the Dandy Fun House where everything is always… FUN AND DANDY!

I’m gonna smack my pickle around for a while You know it’s actually kind of easier to do this game if you just hit it with your finger Oh

It’s kind of unpredictable because it’s on this tether Crazy and you don’t know where it’s gonna go I Like you know I do like it. Maybe I’ll give us seven seven pickle jars Maybe I think seven pickle jars it might be into too(…) Generous here. I don’t know that I kind of the paddles are I don’t know

And if you’d like to help keep me from scraping the bottom of the financial pickle barrel Please consider supporting future productions of the dandy funhouse by visiting our patronage page at dandy funhouse.com Supporters gain access to exclusive bonus features not available through the general pickle population and super supporters get all that same stuff But I’ll also mail you something extra sour from right here at the dandy funhouse pickle jar if you provide your mailing address Podcast listeners may support via the donation button in your listening app of choice if provided and five-star Reviews anywhere you can leave them always get my undying gratitude dude Thanks for crunching with me and the game of pickleball blast Hope we dill ever the goods for you. Don’t forget to come on back here real soon right here to the dandy funhouse Where everything is always fun and dandy!

Neil Dandy is the creator of The Dandy Fun House and the alter-ego of Neil Smith, the Big Cheese at Neil Smith Entertainment, musician, Emcee, Paratransit Driver and Author. Aren’t you impressed?