Things I get a kick out of - Volume Two

Volume Two - Kites

I get a kick out of kites.  Such a seemingly simple invention, but enough to remind us all of our long lost youth, or whatever.

My niece's birthday falls on the day after mine.  She's a September 11th baby, as it turns out, although she was born a couple of years after the namesake day's tragic events.  To celebrate her birthday, most of my family (i.e. - everyone except my youngest brother and I) went camping for the weekend.  I have no use for camping, so I stayed home and smashed my head against the wall... err, watched that disgrace of a football game.

I wasn't quite sure what to get the kid for her birthday, so I decided to keep it simple and go old school.  Well, kinda old school.  I remember the kites from my childhood being fairly cheaply built and not all that impressive.  Nowadays, you can buy all kinds of high tech stuff with the click of a computer mouse.  The only tricky part was trying to balance the advanced nature of a given kite with the skill set of an eight year old girl.  It would do no good to buy some sort of high tech stunt kite and then have her crash it repeatedly.  I settled on a fairly simple lightweight model with a six and a half foot wingspan.

The folks in attendance sent me a couple of photos over the course of the weekend.

So at least she pretended to enjoy the gift, even if ole Uncle Joe didn't know what he was doing.  That's good enough for me.

The only regret that I have now is that I should have bought myself a kite while I was at it.  Flying a kite on this upcoming Saturday is likely to provide a lot more entertainment than watching my Irish get their asses kicked by Michigan State.  I get a kick out of kites.