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A podcast from the Digital Futures Institute at Teachers College, Columbia University about play and pop culture. Professors Haeny Yoon and Nathan Holbert talk with educators, parents and kids about how they play in their work and their lives, and why play and pop culture matter.
The views expressed in this podcast are solely those of the speaker to whom they are attributed. They do not necessarily reflect the views of the faculty, administration, staff or Trustees either of Teachers College or of Columbia University.
Nathan Holbert:
Welcome to Pop & Play, a podcast all about play and pop culture. I'm your host, Nathan, and with me as always is Haeny "Mouth like John McEnroe" Yoon.
Haeny Yoon:
Okay, very good. Okay, I'm Haeny. Today we've got another play date, a new segment, well not so new on Pop and Play, where we invite you to play along with us. Each play date, we'll choose a play experience, let you know in advance what we're up to, and invite a couple guests who are actually better than us.
Nathan Holbert:
In every way.
Haeny Yoon:
Yes, to help us reflect on why this particular form of play matters.
Nathan Holbert:
That's right. And for this play date, we laced up our tennis shoes, we tightened our headbands, and constructed our own net. We actually built our own nets.
Haeny Yoon:
We did build our own net. Yes.
Nathan Holbert:
And we played some pickleball, but we didn't do this alone. We had experts because neither of us had ever pickleballed in our life.
Haeny Yoon:
Yes, never. No. Okay. I was actually kind of good at tennis when I was 15. Okay, but...
Nathan Holbert:
Is it kind of like how you were really good at ice skating?
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah, ice skating was really bad at ice skating if you recall. And I also claimed I was good at tennis and then Neil is like, "No, you're not good at tennis." So I don't know what that means. So we actually needed two mentors that could show us the ropes and put up with all of our jokes about the name of this sport. Okay. So thank God for Kala Naraian.
Srikala Naraian:
Hi.
Haeny Yoon:
And Jon Wargo.
Jon Wargo:
Hello.
Haeny Yoon:
Yes. Kala's professor and chair of our department, curriculum and teaching... I'm sorry, my department. I keep saying our department, but my department curriculum teaching at Teachers College. She is a wonderful chair and a great colleague. Her work is located in disability studies tradition and involves inclusive education and teacher preparation for inclusive ed in elementary. Welcome Kala.
Srikala Naraian:
Thank you. So happy to be here. Though, I wouldn't describe myself as a mentor-
Haeny Yoon:
Oh.
Srikala Naraian:
... in pickleball, anything but, but I'm so glad.
Haeny Yoon:
From here on out, we're going to call you Coach Kala.
Nathan Holbert:
We also have with us Jon Wargo, who's an associate professor at the University of Michigan at Marsal Family School of Education. Jon is a literacy researcher and learning scientists studying media, technology, and youth critical literacies. I suspect he's also an excellent colleague, but I haven't been his colleague, so we're not...
Jon Wargo:
Sometimes.
Haeny Yoon:
He is an excellent colleague.
Nathan Holbert:
Welcome, Jon.
Jon Wargo:
Thank you for having me.
Nathan Holbert:
All right, this is exciting. We're talking pickleball. We did some playing of pickleball, which was a whole experience we're going to get into in a few minutes, but before we dive into the details of rackets and why rackets-
Srikala Naraian:
Paddles.
Nathan Holbert:
... are not-
Jon Wargo:
Paddles.
Nathan Holbert:
... why it's not a racket, paddle. See, this is happening. This won't stop happening.
Haeny Yoon:
You already went down a road when you started off with John McEnroe.
Nathan Holbert:
Keep it clean. This is a family podcast. But look, I might be limited in my understanding about what is and is not a paddle or a racket, okay? I'm sorry. But I'm wondering how much you guys actually know about pickles. Okay? And so we're going to play a game to test your knowledge of pickles.
Srikala Naraian:
Okay. I will be sorely tested. Yes, go ahead.
Nathan Holbert:
I'm going to ask you kind of a trivia type question and you both can discuss and see if you can kind of work out an answer together and we'll see how many you can get. Does that sound okay?
Srikala Naraian:
Sure.
Jon Wargo:
Yeah.
Nathan Holbert:
All right. We'll start easy, I think. Sometimes I think I'm starting easy and then I'm told that I was very wrong. But this brand of pickle features a stork and can be found in grocery store aisles all over the US.
Srikala Naraian:
God, Jon, do you know that? I haven't had-
Jon Wargo:
I can see it. It looks like one of the... It's like a baby stork, right?
Nathan Holbert:
Yep.
Jon Wargo:
Is it Vlasic something? Oh, I don't know what it... What is the name of it?
Srikala Naraian:
I haven't had a pickle in like 15 years.
Jon Wargo:
I hate pickles.
Nathan Holbert:
Oh no.
Srikala Naraian:
But your instinct sounds good to me. The V-
Jon Wargo:
I don't know the name.
Srikala Naraian:
Vlas-something.
Jon Wargo:
Yeah. It's not Vlasic, but... I don't know. I don't know.
Nathan Holbert:
I think it is. It is Vlasic. Nailed it. First question, done. Well done.
Haeny Yoon:
Nailed it. Yep.
Nathan Holbert:
Okay. Well, you haven't had a pickle in 15 years, Jon doesn't like pickles. This could be rough, but...
Haeny Yoon:
Oh, you don't like pickles, Jon?
Jon Wargo:
I hate pickles. Hate pickles. Unless they're fried, love fried pickles.
Nathan Holbert:
This is an insane opinion.
Srikala Naraian:
Oh, pickles can be fried? I thought they were just fermented in a whole lot of salt.
Haeny Yoon:
This is what we do in the Midwest, Kala.
Jon Wargo:
Fry it all.
Haeny Yoon:
Did you not grow up in the Midwest? Because the rest of us did and we fry everything.
Jon Wargo:
Fry everything.
Nathan Holbert:
You didn't have fried pickles? In St. Louis, you had to do that.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah, same.
Srikala Naraian:
I must have missed that boat.
Haeny Yoon:
Same in Illinois.
Srikala Naraian:
Yeah, I don't know.
Haeny Yoon:
Yes.
Nathan Holbert:
Okay. Well, most pickles are well, pickled, but full and half sours are not. What process is used to make these pickles?
Srikala Naraian:
Half sour, what does that mean? Okay, full-
Jon Wargo:
I'm at a loss here.
Srikala Naraian:
Yeah. Like it's a...
Nathan Holbert:
Try to imagine also a variety of kinds of cuisines. There's a lot of different kinds of cuisines that have kind of pickled varieties and they're not always pickled in a way where it's just pouring vinegar and salt in a bucket. There's other ways to pickle things out.
Haeny Yoon:
How do you put cucumbers to pickles is the question.
Nathan Holbert:
Well, no, not exactly, because certain-
Haeny Yoon:
No?
Jon Wargo:
Yeah, vinegar, right?
Nathan Holbert:
Those are just pickled. But there are some kinds of cucumbers that can become pickles that can be done in a non-pickled way.
Srikala Naraian:
Well, I can tell you what it's like, what pickles mean in India.
Haeny Yoon:
Oh, sure.
Srikala Naraian:
They mean a lot of... It's like putting them in hot sauce, immersing them in hot sauce with lots of chilies and salt, of course. And then they marinate in them for days and days and you get a pickle that way.
Haeny Yoon:
You are on to it.
Srikala Naraian:
Is that the pickle you're talking about?
Haeny Yoon:
You're on to-
Nathan Holbert:
You're on to something here.
Haeny Yoon:
That sounds like kimchi.
Nathan Holbert:
Yep. And how is kimchi... What's the process for kimchi?
Jon Wargo:
Fermentation, right?
Nathan Holbert:
There it is. Fermentation. You guys got there.
Haeny Yoon:
Oh my God. We got there by way of India, Korea.
Nathan Holbert:
Yeah. Beautiful. Okay. What nonsense word do the British use for pickled cucumbers?
Jon Wargo:
No idea.
Srikala Naraian:
You know, after 300 years of being colonized, I should know that, right? I'm sorry.
Haeny Yoon:
You are resisting it, Kala. You resist colonization.
Nathan Holbert:
Call them whatever the hell I want. It's gherkin.
Srikala Naraian:
Oh.
Jon Wargo:
Oh.
Nathan Holbert:
You guys have heard that.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah. It's like these answers are on the tip of your tongue and you just have to figure out what they are.
Nathan Holbert:
You have a room in your brain where that is, but you didn't open that door.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah, yeah.
Srikala Naraian:
I thought gherkins were actually those tiny little things.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah. They are those-
Srikala Naraian:
Tiny little cumin.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah, I feel like in the US they're a tiny thing.
Nathan Holbert:
Delicious.
Haeny Yoon:
I mean, for the record, I love pickles.
Nathan Holbert:
Me too.
Haeny Yoon:
Sorry.
Srikala Naraian:
Not working out for me.
Haeny Yoon:
You're not a pickle fan either?
Srikala Naraian:
No.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah, oh my God. I love pickles.
Nathan Holbert:
We can be your pickle coaches.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah. Exactly.
Nathan Holbert:
Well, listen, thank you for playing along. I'm sorry that I had to bring you into a space that both of you have no pleasure for. But listen, as I said before, Haeny and I had never played pickleball before and so this was going to be a new experience for us, but thankfully there's a gym nearby, thankfully there's also a target nearby where I could purchase a couple Target paddles, and we had a pickleball expert in Kala available to show us the ropes. So let's hear a bit of a clip from our outing.
Haeny Yoon:
Kala, thank you for teaching us how to play pickleball. I hope you were impressed with our speed and paddle prowess.
Srikala Naraian:
So impressed.
Haeny Yoon:
But we were-
Srikala Naraian:
Completely impressed, truly.
Haeny Yoon:
No, we were actually really impressed with Kala. We have actually talked about how she has the most consistent serve that we've seen.
Nathan Holbert:
It's low over the nets.
Haeny Yoon:
And powerful.
Nathan Holbert:
It's powerful.
Srikala Naraian:
Oh my. Look at those words you're using to describe it. I was so far from that.
Haeny Yoon:
No, you have a technique to it. Did you see our serves?
Srikala Naraian:
Well, I was just impressed that it went over the net and went deep into the court. I mean, that's all that matters. I don't think the people I play pickleball with are going to tell me, are going to describe me as an expert so far from that. So if it means I have to be an expert with you, that's so be it.
Nathan Holbert:
That's cool. Expertise is a continuum.
Srikala Naraian:
Yeah.
Nathan Holbert:
Well, maybe tell us a little bit for each of you how you got into pickleball. Have you played a racket or paddle sports before and so this was like a natural extension or how did you find yourself here?
Srikala Naraian:
I haven't played racket sports since I was in school. So that was a very long time ago. Yeah, the last I remember playing was Badminton when I was in school and that was in our backyard at home. So it really wasn't any serious any kind of sport really, let alone racket sport. My sister was playing pickleball, and she's retired and she was having so much fun with it, and so I knew there was something there. And then last summer after coming out of the pit of the academic year, it's like, okay, now I can think about other things to do. And so I just decided, okay, maybe I'll give pickleball a chance. And so I signed up for class and I started pickleball. But yeah, you're right.
Haeny Yoon:
How about you, Jon? How did you start?
Jon Wargo:
Well, it's hard to make friends in your 40s when you're moving.
Srikala Naraian:
And your 50s and your 60s, Jon.
Nathan Holbert:
Or your 20s.
Haeny Yoon:
Oh, that's true. Yes. And in your 10s.
Jon Wargo:
I forced my husband to do a Stonewall league when we moved back to Michigan.
Haeny Yoon:
What does a Stonewall league mean?
Jon Wargo:
Sorry, sorry. Stonewall is like a sports organization for LGBTQ folks. So it was a way to sort of meet people. Typically, we had lots of friends in Boston who did kickball and they would go out and go to a bar or a beer garden afterwards and just meet you people and hang out. And so I was like, "Okay, let's do this." And he was like, "Great, kickball." And I was like, "No, they're playing pickleball." And he was like, "What?" And he was like, "Isn't that the sport Chelsea Handler makes fun of?" He was like, "That's not a sport." And so we got paddles. And I had played tennis in high school, so I'm coming into it a little bit differently. We joined a recreational league, so that's important to know. There's recreational and competitive. We joined a recreational league and the first game we had, we were each other's partners, and that's where it went all downhill. It was pretty bad. It was pretty bad, in the sense that he fell, which, who falls-
Haeny Yoon:
During pickleball.
Nathan Holbert:
Ouch.
Jon Wargo:
He fell. He fell at pickleball. I mean, he was wearing high top converse to play.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah, that's not good.
Jon Wargo:
But then according to him, I had this death look over my face where I looked down at him and I said, "You can get up and keep playing or I can find a sub." We've never played pickleball since together because of that. So yeah-
Haeny Yoon:
Does he play pickleball?
Jon Wargo:
He doesn't, Haeny, he doesn't.
Haeny Yoon:
Oh, okay. So only you.
Jon Wargo:
He no longer plays.
Nathan Holbert:
Can't imagine why.
Haeny Yoon:
I mean, it could be the shoes though. Yeah. Well, Kala, I know that in order to develop your skills as a pickleballer, you actually took some lessons, right? And you-
Srikala Naraian:
Yeah. I'm still taking them as in I just go once a week and-
Haeny Yoon:
For the whole year so far?
Srikala Naraian:
Since last summer.
Haeny Yoon:
Okay. Oh, wow.
Nathan Holbert:
Wow. Wow.
Srikala Naraian:
Yeah. And each term session, I have a new group of pickleball partners and we're all beginners and I'm actually enjoying... I mean, it goes back to what Jon was saying earlier, like you go out, you want to make friends or meet people, but like I'm enjoying the kind of groups that we are actually forming each time and we're all a bunch of women playing and it's really interesting.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah. And so these are regulars that have been going since the last summer or they change?
Srikala Naraian:
No, they're all like me. We're just coming in to explore the game for the first time. And we're women. They're mostly women. I haven't seen a single male student in any of those classes.
Haeny Yoon:
Oh really? Okay.
Srikala Naraian:
So they all must be doing some fabulous pickleball playing out there. But most of us in our 40s, 50s, and sometimes 60s like me, and just playing.
Haeny Yoon:
That's cool.
Nathan Holbert:
That's awesome.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah. Jon, have you taken lessons?
Jon Wargo:
Yeah. I've done a couple play with the coach. So there's like three people that are interested in sort of getting better and playing pickleball and then one coach and the coach rotates over two hours and plays with you and against you. And that was really, really informative. There's this coach, shout out Nick from Batch Pickleball in Warren, Michigan, but especially in the first couple of months of playing, he just would scream and be like, "Why are you still back there? Move with me." It was just really, really... It was great. It was really awesome. And yeah, I love the play with the coach. I've never had one-on-one. I don't know what that's like.
Haeny Yoon:
Like one-on-one with the coach? Like he...
Jon Wargo:
Yeah. I see people who do that extended one-on-one, where you just drill with someone, I've never done that. But the play with the coach, that's fun.
Nathan Holbert:
I was thinking that you both kind of mentioned in your pickleball origin stories here, the importance of community, right? In your case, Kala, it was wanting to sort of join a class and sort of get to know some people that were in similar spaces as you, and Jon, you're a new transplant and wanted to get to know people. I'm wondering, was community the primary motivator? Was it also maybe though, as you just mentioned, it feels good to burn off all that energy and to really work your body? Is it fitness? Maybe if one thing got you started, what's keeping you going with this hobby?
Srikala Naraian:
Yeah, I'm so attached to it now, even though I just go there for like once a week, but whatever the weather and even if all the trains are down and the buses are not running, I will still find a way to get there. So you're right there. Yeah, the 40 bucks a lesson, of course, I want to make sure I get my money's worth, that's part of it too, but I think it's just like I like to use my body in a different way and I like to keep something open, keep what my body might do, I don't know. And I want to keep that sense of unknowing, unpredictability. And there's some pleasure in just sort of keeping it open to what might happen.
Jon Wargo:
I love that.
Srikala Naraian:
Yeah. I think that's what keeps me going.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah. I mean, this isn't the first time I have talked about Orangetheory on this podcast, but I'm like really into-
Nathan Holbert:
Ninth or 10th perhaps.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah, ninth or 10th. Okay. I'm really into Orangetheory and I feel like for some of the same reasons, Kala, that you were saying is that I like the idea that I'm forcing myself to do something very different than what I usually do like eight hours a day or however many hours a day it is and that I'm like shifting myself into a different kind of space and I think there's something really powerful about that even though like I will say I don't go to Orangetheory and talk to everybody. I'm not like building community at Orangetheory, but there is something about being in this space with other people in a totally different, like we're all there from every walk of life and we are kind of just being in this space together and trying this thing out.
Srikala Naraian:
100%.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah. And I just like getting out of sometimes this space of academia.
Nathan Holbert:
Jon?
Jon Wargo:
Yeah, no, same. I mean, I think immediately I was just looking for a group of people to hang out with and play with, and then I became sort of like interested in it as a form of fitness just to sort of break up the week. So I go about three times a week, twice during the week and once on the weekend. But it's also in the same way, like I don't know how it is in New York, but there are different sort of cultures at each of the clubs. And the club that I go to most is very much community centered and the times that I go, it's like the same 20 people every week that go. And so I hear about grandkids, we talk politics, there's a lot of things that happen there, but I keep going back just because it is one of the few places where I totally shut off my brain for everything but pickleball. And in the summer it's one of those places that at least in Michigan, most of our pickleball places are not air conditioned and so it like just feels like I ran a marathon even though I'm playing pickleball. So I feel like I'm getting my workout on, and yeah, no, I love it.
Srikala Naraian:
Yeah. You come to know yourself differently. I think that's the potential of going there and yeah now you call me a pickleball player. I would not have described myself as.
Haeny Yoon:
[inaudible 00:19:08].
Srikala Naraian:
But yeah, you come to know yourself in a way that feels new and good and something that, like you said, your routine work doesn't allow you to do, right? You get stuck in that.
Haeny Yoon:
I mean, that makes me think about just play and how when I first started thinking about play and children and classrooms that I was all about like play is the social thing and children really need it for their social wellbeing and it's circulating social conditions that happen during play. And I think the more that I research children at play and especially different kinds of children and how they enter play, it's not always about the community like yours. For sometimes it is about the community. Sometimes it's to know a certain part of yourself that you haven't accessed, right? Sometimes it's to be alone and to be part, you know, to have things happening around you, but that you want to have that space to be by yourself and do that, right? So there's like so many different ways that people sort of enter into these play spaces and it's not necessarily a monolith of reasons why people do this. Like they don't do it just for community. They don't do it just for health, but they do it for their own individual reasons too.
Srikala Naraian:
Yeah. Yeah, and I think you're right, and in the beginning for me, the fun part was very important like I want to have fun. And so if I wasn't getting my balls over the net or if I wasn't playing well, I wouldn't let that sort of spill over. For me, the point of being out there is to have fun and that was it. But having said that, I will say that once you develop a little bit of skill, you can also get to have more fun, bring something into it and then you get a little bit more fun than you might have otherwise.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah. It's like a back and forth, right? Like you have fun, but then you stop and develop the skill a little bit, then yeah.
Nathan Holbert:
Yeah, but-
Haeny Yoon:
Oh gosh, he's going to say something.
Nathan Holbert:
Just for fun... No, I totally agree with you, but just for fun, I think there are also some times where you decide to engage in an activity like this and then you realize you're really bad at it.
Haeny Yoon:
Are you talking about me ice skating?
Nathan Holbert:
I mean, that was one idea that came to mind, but I was also thinking about when I was... This was maybe 15 years ago or something and I was a grad student and one of my friends, we were like, "We should play squash." There's these squash courts at Northwestern and it'd be a great workout and we're all stressed and busy with dissertations. And so shout out to David Weintraub, who's also an academic at the University of Maryland, we would go play squash once or twice a week and we would get in that... You know, if you haven't played squash, you're in a room and there's a wall and you're hitting a ball against the wall. And he would basically stand in the middle and just kind of like casually be hitting the ball and I would be running full speed across this room just to try to keep up with him, and I think I maybe beat him once out of the many, many, many times we played.
And I had this epiphany where I had always sort of thought as myself when I was a younger person is like pretty good at sports. I could kind of pick up sports pretty quickly and I was generally fine at them. But then I realized while losing in squash that I wasn't actually in control of my appendages in any meaningful way. It was just that I moved a lot faster than most people like bothered to move and so it was like pure Brownian motion occasionally put me... So then I was like, "Well, maybe squash isn't that fun." I don't know.
Haeny Yoon:
And I think that's okay.
Nathan Holbert:
It is.
Haeny Yoon:
Right?
Nathan Holbert:
Yeah.
Haeny Yoon:
Because I'm like, "I'm not good at ice skating. I probably won't do that again."
Nathan Holbert:
Let's try a different sport.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah.
Nathan Holbert:
Let's try pickleball.
Haeny Yoon:
I think that's fair. I think you kind of start to discover those things when you allow yourself to play, right?
Nathan Holbert:
Yeah, the play is in the exploration and experimentation-
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah. For sure.
Nathan Holbert:
You can always back up and go a different direction if it's not for you, but trying is fun. And pickleball was a lot of fun. I had a great time.
Haeny Yoon:
I had a good time too actually.
Srikala Naraian:
You were great partners, both of you. Because the ball went over the net, and so you can hit it back.
Haeny Yoon:
We got really excited and we had like a five streak volley. Welcome to the future of Olympic pickleball here.
Nathan Holbert:
Okay. I'm curious though. So one thing that's fun about this conversation with the two of you is that I think thinking of you both as pickleball players is like unexpected in some way. And I don't mean that in any negative way, just like, oh, they play pickleball? Wow. And so I wonder like if we were to ask how your academic friends and colleagues might describe you, what would they say and how might your pickleball friends and colleagues describe you? Are there similarities? Are there differences? Are you kind of like playing with the sort of different identities or personas?
Srikala Naraian:
So the first time someone was surprised that I played pickleball, I was surprised that they were surprised. What's so surprising that is it because I'm... I don't know, why should it be surprising that I play pickleball? But I went along with the fact that people were surprised and excited. Okay, so there's something cool about what I'm doing. So okay, I felt cool about playing pickleball, but maybe, and I don't know what they usually think. I have a member of my academic circle sitting right here in front of me so it's hard to find words, but maybe they would think I'm serious and so that's why pickleball is like a surprising thing to be doing, or maybe the word pickle ball suggests something silly and fun. It's not like playing tennis.
Nathan Holbert:
Whimsical.
Srikala Naraian:
Yeah, whimsical, that's the perfect word, right?
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah.
Srikala Naraian:
So maybe they might see me more as serious.
Haeny Yoon:
Do your pickleball colleagues, how do you imagine they would describe you?
Srikala Naraian:
You know, probably serious too. I think I'm stuck with that, but we're probably good team player. I think we all play well as a team and I think that's been important for each group that I have been a part of.
Nathan Holbert:
I mean, that serve is serious.
Srikala Naraian:
Well, it's funny you say that, because I think I've had so much of... I've been thinking so much about the pedagogy that goes on in these spaces and not always thrilled by it. It makes me kind of wonder about when people are constantly telling you that's not what you should be doing. I heard that so many times. That's why it's taken me eight months to get a serve and to get the ball across the net, I think. It's like we're constantly hearing in the nicest, kindest way, that's not what you should be doing, then that's all you can focus on is not what you should be doing.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah. Instead of focusing on the parts that you're doing right and then developing those.
Srikala Naraian:
Yeah, or just knowing what to do, just that. But...
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah. Yeah.
Nathan Holbert:
But Jon, you sound like you kind of like the pedagogy a little bit of the coach yelling at you to follow and all that.
Jon Wargo:
Yeah, yeah. I think that it's definitely, it's helped me sort of learn on the fly a little bit, especially when you're playing with someone, right? I think in pickleball with doubles, there has to be sort of, you're sort of following one another going forward and backward and that's been really helpful. I also love all the tech behind it. So there's aerial cameras that will like show you if a ball was actually in or out at some of the spots I'd play in and I get obsessed looking at like, "Well, what went wrong with that shot and what could have done better?" Which probably says more about me than my pickleball.
Haeny Yoon:
So you're trying to analyze data analysis?
Jon Wargo:
Yeah. I'm just like, "Well, if you were up at the kitchen line a little sooner, you probably would have gotten it."
Haeny Yoon:
What's the kitchen? Tell our listeners what the kitchen sink is. The kitchen-
Jon Wargo:
It's not the kitchen sink.
Nathan Holbert:
I don't think the sink is involved.
Haeny Yoon:
Oh, kitchen.
Nathan Holbert:
Keep trying to add sink into this.
Haeny Yoon:
I thought I heard kitchen sink. Okay? Sorry.
Srikala Naraian:
I know. I love that you added the sink to it.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah, kitchen. Tell us what the kitchen is.
Srikala Naraian:
See, I'm a little nervous trying to explain that in front of Jon. So Jon, maybe you should go because you probably know the rules better than I do.
Jon Wargo:
No, no, no. It's just sort of that mid-court line that sort of separates the two sides of the right and the left for the service line. And it's where sort of the majority of the game happens, which is with dinking, right? Which is that sort of soft back and forth play where you want to keep the ball as low and slow as you can.
Haeny Yoon:
Is that the goal?
Srikala Naraian:
See, that's something new I'm learning right now about dinking.
Jon Wargo:
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. So-
Haeny Yoon:
Is the goal to-
Srikala Naraian:
Sorry.
Haeny Yoon:
Is the goal to try to dink the ball every time?
Jon Wargo:
Not every time, right? But the way that I've played with like... And this is why I love playing with 65 plus folks because they have like hints, new hints. And so they don't do a lot of like the hard baseline sort of moves, it's all about the finesse of the sort of soft dink. And so the most point will sort of end or begin right at the kitchen line.
Haeny Yoon:
I just had a revelation that I feel like me and Nathan were playing pickleball, like you would play squash.
Nathan Holbert:
Probably.
Haeny Yoon:
We were just running all over the place-
Nathan Holbert:
Full speed.
Haeny Yoon:
... trying to hit it as hard as possible, but that was not the way to play the game.
Nathan Holbert:
I mean, I think I keep getting confused because I'm very good at drinking in the kitchen. It's the dinking of the kitchen that I struggle with.
Srikala Naraian:
Nathan.
Haeny Yoon:
Oh my God.
Jon Wargo:
Drink while dinking [inaudible 00:29:27]-
Nathan Holbert:
Why not both? I always say.
Haeny Yoon:
Good one.
Nathan Holbert:
So thank you guys both for taking us on this journey and showing us your hobby and for teaching us about it. I mean, I had a blast. It was a lot of fun. I'd like to do it again.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah. I'd like to do it again too. I think it'll be fun.
Nathan Holbert:
Maybe we'll have some dinks and drinks in the future.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah. Maybe Jon will actually come here and do this with us.
Jon Wargo:
Yeah, I'd love to.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah.
Nathan Holbert:
Well, before we let you go though, we really need to know what is popping in your life? What are some things, what are some pop culture, maybe some books, movies, TV shows, games, music, plays, whatever it is that you're encountering and experiencing right now that is really exciting to you and that you want our listeners to know about? Jon, what's popping for you?
Jon Wargo:
What's popping? I mean, I feel like I find things four years after the zeitgeist of the moment. Same. I just finished this book called Song of Achilles, broke down, slapped amazing.
Nathan Holbert:
That's a good book.
Jon Wargo:
Amber Mark is a pop singer that some, one of my students were like, "I think you'd like this." Obsessed. Oh my gosh, listen. And then I am on the current sort of train of The Pitt needing The Pitt: Night Shift.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah.
Jon Wargo:
But not because I love... I actually cry and sob in every episode of The Pitt because of just the hospital trauma of that. But I can't stop watching and I'm here for the night shift.
Haeny Yoon:
I feel like The Pitt: Night Shift is coming soon.
Jon Wargo:
I hope so.
Haeny Yoon:
I feel like they're setting it up.
Jon Wargo:
Let's manifest it.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah.
Nathan Holbert:
I haven't watched The Pitt.
Srikala Naraian:
You haven't watched The Pitt?
Haeny Yoon:
It's so good.
Nathan Holbert:
I don't really do the hospital drama shows.
Srikala Naraian:
Okay. There's a lot of blood and gore.
Haeny Yoon:
It is. The problem is I like to watch TV while I'm eating dinner. I cannot watch The Pitt while doing it because...
Srikala Naraian:
I do watch The Pitt while eating dinner.
Haeny Yoon:
Oh my God.
Nathan Holbert:
Oh wow.
Srikala Naraian:
Because I think at this point I've sort of become oblivious to the blood and the gore. I'm into the stories now, I want to know the stories.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah, the stories are so good. Yeah.
Srikala Naraian:
But yeah, I do watch a lot of The Pitt too. It's been fun. It's like my Friday ritual. I like to catch up with what's the next episode. I carry this serious strain and everything else I do. So I'm reading books, which I are probably really serious, but are really intense, but I really enjoy reading that before I go to bed at night. I'm reading this book called The Land in Winter by Andrew Miller. It's really about four people and their interiorities, their inside for the entire book, like 400 pages, but it's like it's so great.
Haeny Yoon:
400 pages?
Srikala Naraian:
Or something like that. 300 to 400 pages and it's so gripping. And then I break off from that and I really am into this little word game on the New Yorker app, it's called Shuffalo. It's just like...
Haeny Yoon:
Is it like Boggle?
Srikala Naraian:
I don't know. It's just like there's a buffalo, the image of a buffalo standing on a wheel with letters and then it keeps scrambling the letters and you have to make words with it.
Nathan Holbert:
Okay. It's kind of Boggle-like.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah, yeah, it is like Boggle.
Srikala Naraian:
That's giving me the most amount of joy.
Nathan Holbert:
That's great.
Srikala Naraian:
Play that game. Yeah.
Haeny Yoon:
Yeah, no, I love this conversation because I think the purpose of why we wanted to do today was this idea that we're academics and we have this sort of persona that we have to keep up, right? Whether it's being serious or intellectual or caring about scholarly things or like there's all these reasons why we have to be like this and I like the idea that there's so many multitudes and parts of us that kind of weigh invisible because we're not able to show it in these spaces. And I really appreciate that you're able to take us into that world.
Nathan Holbert:
Yeah. Thank you so much for connecting all the worlds together. That was great.
Srikala Naraian:
Oh, thank you for having us.
Jon Wargo:
Yeah, thank you.
Srikala Naraian:
It's wonderful to be here.
Haeny Yoon:
Thank you.
Nathan Holbert:
Yeah. And thank you to our listeners for joining us for another episode. Hopefully this is a play date, so hopefully you get a chance to get out there and then play some pickleball and-
Haeny Yoon:
Set up your own courts, people.
Nathan Holbert:
Yeah, build your net. They're going to make you do it. But have fun and let us know how it goes. You can find us on Instagram, you can find us on Bluesky and we'd love to hear about your play experience with pickleball. And as always, leave us a review, smash the subscribe button, whatever the case may be. Go watch us on YouTube so you can see the sweet headbands that are core to this episode.
Haeny Yoon:
I know. Thank you for leaving us out of the headband. Yeah.
Nathan Holbert:
All right and thanks everybody. Bye.
Haeny Yoon:
Bye.