Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
No piece of cake, finding toy will wipe smile off your face
I — someone without kids — wanted to give a friend’s daughter a gift for Christmas, and began by researching this year’s hot toys.
A hover board? No, those are too hot. They keep bursting into flames.
The Girl Scouts Deluxe Cookie Oven? She, unlike “Miss Jennifer,” doesn’t eat sugar.
Star Wars: The Force Awakens Battle Action Millennium Falcon? Too many words. Who has time to call every store in town, asking “Do you have the Star Wars: The Force Awakens Battle Action Millennium Falcon?” 324 times?
But then the answer was as easy as pie! I would get her that Pie Face game that I read about.
Here’s manufacturer Hasbro’s description: “The exciting Pie Face game is filled with fun and suspense, and somebody’s bound to get splatted! Just put some delicious whipped cream … on the ‘hand’ of this hilarious game unit and start turning the handles. It could go off at any time, so keep your fingers crossed and hope you’re not the one who gets a splat in the face! You score a
point for every time you turn the handle without getting pie-faced, and the one who scores 25 points wins.”
The game includes one pie thrower, one throwing arm, two handles, a chin rest, splash guard mask, spinner and sponge. As for the “Squirty Cream” mentioned on the box illustration, look closer; it says “Not Included.”
For $19.99, it wasn’t hightech or high- priced, but it sounded like good, giddy fun. It seemed like 2015’s answer to Mouse Trap and Hungry Hungry Hippos — games I still enjoyed playing, even after owning an Atari. I’d log on to Amazon, and have it shipped.
Wait … it cost what?! More
than twice as much? Maybe I wasn’t logged in to Amazon Prime for the free two-day shipping. No, I was. The game was just ridiculously priced as I scrolled through options.
I’d log on to a chain retailer’s site and try again. Nope, none available. I’d try another, and another, and another. This Pie was on fire; the silly new old-school toy was sold out everywhere!
A sane person would have given up, saved her time and energy and found another toy. But, as you figured out a long time ago, sane people don’t write newspaper columns.
Now, it was on. I quickly became pie-eyed with a preoccupation to get Pie Face. I just had to, er, I mean my friend’s cutie-pie, just had to have it!
I did more online scouring of stores (they didn’t come through). I called retailers — nice as pie — asking when their next shipments would be arriving ( they didn’t know). I refused to give up my quest or my high-applepie-in-the-sky hopes.
My next stop was scouring the auction sites. On eBay, a Wisconsin seller actually was selling single Pie Face games for a buy-it-now price of $399. Make that $411.95; the seller wanted $12.95 for shipping too.
After seeing that $ 400 price, that original $42 didn’t seem so bad. Back I went to Amazon to eat humble pie and order it.
But hey, I got free shipping! And I (cue The Jeffersons theme) finally got a piece of the pie (well, I got it after I drove to the next city to retrieve it. I was so whipped into a frenzy, I accidentally shipped the whipped cream game to my old address!). Ahem, I mean my friend’s daughter will get Pie Face.
I’ll shut my pie hole now.