"The French looked at a dining table and saw an opportunity to have dinner," bloviated British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. "We looked at a dining table and saw an opportunity to play whiff-whaff [i.e. the earliest incarnation of table tennis]." Much like nationalist rhetoric, the dining room table continues to evoke a range of responses. Like a more functional Rorschach inkblot test, the humble table continues to inspire recreational reinterpretation in around the world. From its aforementioned post-prandial origins in Victorian England, "whiff-whaff" has spent the ensuing century and a half composing variations on a theme. From around the world, although still within the ever-sunlit Commonwealth of the former British Empire, a new approach to the table emerged. In 1979, an engineer in New Zealand invented "triples," or three-a-side table tennis. Now a popular variant in Australia, triples sees teams of three rally across a more egalitarian round table. The rules prohibit any one player from hitting the ball more than twice in succession, thus preventing any one team member from monopolizing the fun. Now, two French companies have teamed up to reinvent the wheel yet again. exercice, a design firm, has collaborated with furniture makers NEDJ to launch "ping pang," their new line of mind-bending ping-pong tables. Pictured is the "rebond," with the novel wings creating new angles of attack. (Good luck hitting an around-the-net shot, though.) The "golf" table, in addition to its butterfly-like design (the insect, that is, not to be confused with the traditional table tennis equipment manufacturer) features a hole in each side which functions as a point-ending shot. The "trio" features a tripartite net, resembling the Mercedes-Benz logo, for three separate players. Finally, bringing it full circle is the "tournant," a smaller version of the round "triples" table. Instead of three-against-three, the goal of tournant is to hit the ball and then run around to the other side, lather, rinse and repeat. Ideal for parties, any number of players can theoretically participate. While Prime Minister Johnson boasts of an innovation from bygone centuries, the world has since taken the idea and run with it. Where will the next great innovation in our sport come from? The ball is in your court.

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