recomendations....?

Just pump it up really hard, to the point it starts to become difficult.
Thump the kite. It will start to ping when it's ready. You will get use to the sound it makes after a while, as Bryan said.

Tom, I wasn't trying to be a jerk, I just know that up means different things to people on things like arms/lines...
I just didn't want Jason getting it backwards.

Yeah, that was weird with the bridle. I had flown it for awhile already on the water for a couple sessions (it was a demo kite), but put new Qlines on the bar and wanted to tune it right before we rode. When we launched it again (like the 3rd time that day) it wouldn't steer too well.
The front bridle wasn't even attached to the kite. Never seen that. How it came loose after all that time is weird.