kite
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: enpr: kīt
ipa: /kaɪt/
rhymes: -aɪt
Forms: form: kites
form: kiting
form: kited
form: kited
Etymology: The noun is from Middle English kyte, kīte, kete (“a kite endemic to Europe, especially the red kite (Milvus milvus)”), from Old English cȳta (“kite; bittern”), from Proto-West Germanic *kūtijō, diminutive of Proto-Germanic *kūts (“bird of prey”), from Proto-Indo-European *gewH-d- (“to cry, screech”). The English word is cognate with Scots kyt, kyte (“kite; bird of prey”), Middle High German kiuzelīn, kützlīn (“owling”) (modern German Kauz (“owl”)). Possibly a doublet of coot.
Sense 3 (“lightweight toy”) is from the fact that it hovers in the air like the bird.
The verb is derived from the noun.
Senses: examples: text: Rising interest rates have kited the cost of housing.
text: […] when he saw the fuse of the firecracker was lighted, he turned the torch on the powder under the barrel of dried apples, and in a second everything went kiting; the barrel of dried apples with the cat in it went up to the ceiling, the stove was blown over the counter, the cheese box and the old groceryman went with a crash to the back end of the store, the front windows blew out on the sidewalk, the old man rushed out the back door with his whiskers singed and yelled "Fire!"
ref: 1907, Geo[rge] W[ilbur] Peck, chapter XVII, in Peck’s Bad Boy with the Cowboys, Chicago, Ill.: Stanton and Van Vliet Co., →OCLC, pages 292–293:
text: Lombard swung at the sweet pea he had dropped, caught it neatly with the toe of his shoe, and kited it upward with grim zest, as though doing that made him feel a lot better.
ref: 1942, William Irish [pseudonym; Cornell Woolrich], Phantom Lady (Story Press Book), Philadelphia, Pa.; New York, N.Y.: J. B. Lippincott Co., →OCLC, page 189:
text: Today, the Bangs auction house would have been rubbing its hands with unconcealed glee and kiting the price of the manuscript into the stratosphere. In 1877, no bidding took place. Bangs merely announced that the letter had been sold for $13.
ref: 2009, Thomas Fleming, “George Washington: The Agonies of Honor”, in The Intimate Lives of the Founding Fathers, New York, N.Y.: Smithsonian Books, →ISBN; 1st Harper paperback edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper; Smithsonian Books, 2010, →ISBN, page 5:
glosses: To cause (something) to move upwards rapidly like a toy kite; also (chiefly US, figuratively) to cause (something, such as costs) to increase rapidly.
examples: text: A pharmacist "kited" and "shorted" a significant percentage of prescriptions. "Kiting" refers to the pharmacist's forging upward the number of pills originally prescribed by the physician, charging Medicaid for the increased amount but providing the patient with the originally prescribed quantity.
ref: 1970 June 2, Lowell E. Bellin, “Statement of Dr. Lowell E. Bellin, First Deputy Commissioner, New York City Department of Health”, in Medicare and Medicaid: Hearings before the Subcommittee on Medicare-Medicaid of the Committee on Finance, United States Senate, Ninety-first Congress, Second Session: Part 2 of 2 Parts: […], Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, →OCLC, page 535:
text: Pharmacists have kited Medicaid prescriptions by raising the number of pills called for on a prescription blank from, say, 100 to 200, and billing Medicaid for the larger amount.
ref: 1975, Spencer Klaw, The Great American Medicine Show: The Unhealthy State of U.S. Medical Care, and What can be Done about It, New York, N.Y.: Viking Press, →ISBN, page 191:
text: Sir, I have a lead that the sergeants in charge at the down town airmen's club have been kiting the winnings on the slot machines. […] Some of them will give the kid his $10.00 winnings, have him sign for it in the ledger. After the kid walks away he/they add a zero to make it look like the kid won a $100 instead of the ten. Then they pocket the $90.00.
ref: 2009 July 9, Martin Sandy Doria, “Gao Shang Air Station”, in The Fungido Journals, Bloomington, Ind.: AuthorHouse, →ISBN, page 84:
glosses: To tamper with a document or record by increasing the quantity of something beyond its proper amount so that the difference may be unlawfully retained; in particular, to alter a medical prescription for this purpose by increasing the number of pills or other items.
topics: video-games
coordinate_terms: pull
bait
glosses: To keep ahead of (an enemy) and repeatedly attack it from a distance, without exposing oneself to danger.
examples: text: I hate it when my knight is kited away from the castle that I'm attacking!
topics: video-games
coordinate_terms: pull
bait
glosses: To attack (an enemy) or otherwise cause it to give chase, so as to lead it somewhere (like a kite is led on a string), for example into a trap or ambush or away from its comrades or something it was protecting.
examples: text: If you're pulling or kiting a creature and it aggros an innocent passer-by, it's your fault and you should apologize.
ref: 2001, Juanita Jones, Everquest Player’s Guide: Prima’s Official Strategy Guide, Roseville, Calif.: Prima Games, →ISBN, page 70:
text: The wind kited us toward shore.
text: It was mere happenstance that the Weston meteor kited across the sky on December 14, 1807, the same day President [Thomas] Jefferson's Non-Importation Act, which restricted trade with Great Britain and France during the Napoleonic Wars, went into effect.
ref: 2010, Cathryn J. Prince, “The Misquote Heard Round the World”, in A Professor, A President, and A Meteor: The Birth of American Science, Amherst, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, →ISBN, page 130:
text: In the distance creatures on leathery wings kited across the sky, lofted by thermal winds.
ref: 2019, Amy J. Murphy, chapter 13, in Pat Dobie, editor, Allies and Enemies: Legacy (Allies and Enemies; book 4), [s.l.]: Amy J. Murphy:
topics: video-games
coordinate_terms: pull
bait
synonyms: soar
glosses: To (cause to) glide in the manner of a kite (“bird”).
examples: text: Want to go kite with me this weekend?
text: Finally, if you have no one to fly a kite with, you can kite alone.
ref: 1981 March, “Fun on a Kite String”, in Austin H. Kiplinger, editor, Changing Times: The Kiplinger Magazine, volume 35, number 3, Editors Park, Md.: The Kiplinger Washington Editors, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 34:
text: Only during the brief time of experimentation with flight that preceded the invention of the airplane, when kites fired the western imagination with visions of human flight, did kiting become significant.
ref: 1997, Norman Schmidt, “Kites are Universal”, in The Great Kite Book (A Sterling/Tamos Book), Winnipeg, Manitoba: TAMOS Books, →ISBN; republished as Best Ever Paper Kites, New York, N.Y.: Sterling Publishing Company; Winnipeg, Manitoba: TAMOS Books, 2003, →ISBN, page 3:
text: Then there was the motorized paraglider. I was actually lucky on this one—I had a full four days to practice on it. However, I was also dealing with a 10-pound (4.5 kg) motor on my back and a huge parachute that I had to learn to kite behind me.
ref: 2005, Danielle Burgio, with Jennifer Worick, “Coordination”, in The Stuntwoman’s Workout: Get Your Body Ready for Anything, Philadelphia, Pa.: Quirk Books, →ISBN, page 144, column 2:
glosses: To manipulate like a toy kite; also, usually preceded by an inflection of go: to fly a toy kite.
examples: text: He was convicted of kiting checks and sentenced to two years in prison.
text: “An affair of honour!” said O’Flaherty, squaring himself. He smelt powder in everything.
 “More like an affair of dishonour,” said Toole, buttoning his coat. “He’s been ‘kiting’ all over the town. Nutter can distrain for his rent to-morrow, and Cluffe called him outside the bar to speak with him; put that and that together, sir.”
ref: 1863, J[oseph] Sheridan Le Fanu, “In Which Dr. Sturk Tries This Way and That for a Reprieve on the Eve of Execution”, in The House by the Church-yard. […], volume II, London: Tinsley, Brothers, […], →OCLC, pages 65–66:
text: The fame and money brought in by Only in America meant no more name changes, no need to kite checks, and no sneaking past the landlord.
ref: 2015, Kimberly Marlowe Hartnett, “Scandal and Resurrection”, in Carolina Israelite: How Harry Golden Made Us Care about Jews, the South, and Civil Rights, Chapel Hill, N.C.: University of North Carolina Press, →ISBN, page 163:
topics: banking
business
glosses: To write or present (a cheque) on an account with insufficient funds, either to defraud or expecting that funds will become available by the time the cheque clears.
examples: text: Andy also kept a box of that [steel wool] in his cell, although he didn't get it from me—I imagine he kited it from the prison laundry.
ref: 1982 August 27, Stephen King, “Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption”, in Different Seasons, New York, N.Y.: Viking Press, →ISBN; republished in Stephen King Goes to the Movies, 1st Pocket Books paperback edition, New York, N.Y.: Pocket Books, February 2009, →ISBN, page 470:
text: Little bastards were always trying to kite stuff, particularly the candy and the girly magazines.
ref: 2001, Stephen King, Dreamcatcher: A Novel, New York, N.Y.: Pocket Books, →ISBN; 1st Gallery Books trade paperback edition, New York, N.Y.: Gallery Books, January 2018, →ISBN, page 611:
glosses: To steal.
examples: text: We spent the afternoon kiting around the bay.
text: If we kited again, it would be very dangerous with the steep slope and the heavy weight crashing on behind us and, in any event, Pat and Dave's kites were ridiculously tangled.
ref: 2010, Alastair Vere Nicoll, “An End and a Beginning”, in Riding the Ice Wind: By Kite and Sledge across Antarctica, London; New York, N.Y.: I.B. Tauris, →ISBN:
text: A rare north wind and conditions of good visibility allowed me to try my luck at kiting again. Without stopping for chocolate and taking quick gulps of energy orange from my Thermos, I kited 117 miles in one day.
ref: 2008, Ranulph Fiennes, “Solo South”, in Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know, London: Hodder Paperbacks, →ISBN:
glosses: To travel by kite, as when kitesurfing.
examples: text: They commenced whipping their horses at the base, and, as one of the prisoners expressed it, "they went kiting up the hill, and for nearly a mile after the summit had been gained."
ref: 1857, Sara T[appan] L[awrence] Robinson, “Arrest of G. Jenkins and G. W. Brown”, in Kansas; Its Interior and Exterior Life. […], 7th edition, Boston, Mass.: Crosby, Nichols and Company; Cincinnati, Oh.: George S. Blanchard; London: Sampson Low, Son & Co., →OCLC, page 263:
text: Q. The supervisor of a particular district would go around in his carriage. […] They went kiting around for a couple of weeks?
A. Yes, sir; for four weeks prior to election.
Q. Were the carriages necessary?
A. I didn't see any necessity for them.
ref: 1876 June 13, George S. Thompson (witness), “Testimony Taken by the Committee on Expenditures in the Department of Justice in Reference to the Use of the Secret Service Fund”, in Index to Reports of Committees of the House of Representatives for the First Session of the Forty-fourth Congress, 1875–’76, Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, →OCLC, page 297:
text: […] the big boy stuck his foot out so she fell. Nursie saw and started for her, but she scrambled up and went kiting for the bench, and climbed on it, […]
ref: 1915, Gene Stratton-Porter, “Little Brother”, in Michael O’Halloran, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, Page & Company, →OCLC, page 109:
glosses: To move rapidly; to rush.
examples: text: This column action causes the tow line to kite either to the port or the starboard side, […]
ref: 1973 December 17, Clarence K. Chatten, Saul A. Eller, Reece Folb, Arthur P. Brisbane, Weather Resistant Segmented Fairing for a Tow Cable, US Patent 3,899,991 (PDF version), column 1:
topics: engineering
natural-sciences
nautical
physical-sciences
transport
glosses: To deflect sideways in the water.
examples: text: Prison Hall in Central Hospital was claimed by some patients to be "organized" in the more extensive manner of prisons for the sane. Here, it was claimed, an attendant could be bribed to "kite" a letter or bring in contraband, […]
ref: 1961, Erving Goffman, “The Underlife of a Public Institution: A Study of Ways of Making Out in a Mental Hospital”, in Asylums: Essays on the Social Situation of Mental Patients and Other Inmates (Anchor; A277), Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, →OCLC; republished New Brunswick, N.J.; London: Aldine Transaction, 2007 (2009 printing), →ISBN, footnote 166, page 301:
text: I have been working like a dam mule this morning and just found time to kite you.
ref: 1966, Rose Giallombardo, Society of Women: A Study of a Women’s Prison, New York, N.Y.: John Wiley & Sons, →OCLC, page 236:
glosses: To pass a (usually concealed) letter or oral message, especially illegally, into, within, or out of a prison.
Derived terms: word: kite around
word: kiter
word: kiting