It was another hot and humid day in New Orleans, the sun was shining, and S. was still in town, so after riding our bikes to campus for class, we headed over to N.’s for po-boys at Domilise’s and a bike ride to the zoo. Well, Domilise’s was closed unexpectedly, and the zoo’s closed on Mondays, so we grabbed sandwiches at a terrible restaurant and decided to ride over to the levee to look at the Mississippi River. I could look at that river forever. It is so beautiful and also not. I mean, the things we do to that river! And all the junk from Minnesota down the full length of the United States ends up here in Louisiana. Sigh. But it is still a lovely way to spend an afternoon, lazing about on the banks of the Mississippi. I decided on the spur of the moment that the whole trip would be improved with kites–I mean, what isn’t better with kites–so we stopped at the drugstore, ponied up our three bucks each, and left with a couple of kites. I chose this one: Peregrine Falcon(tm) Kite With Realistic Wing Flapping Motion. I’m not sure Gayla Industries can really trademark “Peregrine Falcon,” but I guess they can. The air was positively still, but we figured there’s always wind at the Fly, that sprawling park behind the Audubon Zoo. No such luck today. But I somehow managed to coax the kite up, actually probably due to the realistic wing flapping motion. The Sky Fire kite never managed to get off the ground. I gave the string to S., who got the thing to fly too, so I could snap a picture of it realistically flapping its wings in the nonexistent breeze. Yep, today I rode my bike to the park to fly a kite. Summer is off to a really good start.