New York Minknit

It’s good I started the sock over again because I realized I had been doing the double decrease wrong. I realize everyone and their mother in blogland has made Jaywalkers, so, this is hardly revelatory information, but when you slip the two stitches knitwise for the double decrease, slip them together, not indiviudally.

Okay, above is a photo of the sock waiting for Billy Joel at his Wednesday Final [ish] Play at Shea. I have always like Billy Joel, even though I know he is considered a little lame by many people. My theory about Billy Joel is that he’s like the Vows section in the New York Times–everyone is a fan, no one wants to admit it.* (If you read the Sunday New York Times, you read Vows, aka “the wedding section,” aka “the women’s sports pages,” even if you’re a man. It’s a fascinating section and if you claim you don’t read it, you’re lying.) *Except if you’re from Long Island, whose entire population showed up at Shea, I think. They love Billy Joel, without shame or reservations.

One of my friends claims she was a Billy Joel fan until she saw the video for Uptown Girl, which she claims was “him jumping around in a ridiculous jumpsuit,” which made her lose all respect for him. I never have had MTV, so I was spared this video (though I just watched it on YouTube, and it is kind of crazy. But it was the ’80s! I have another friend whose favorite movie is Grease 2…it was a weird time.)

Anyway, in college, my roommate and I (okay, it was mainly me) somehow borrowed a Best of Billy Joel tape from our neighbor (which dates when I went to college–people still had tapes, though even then, they were rare) and we were like, damn these old people, because we totally would have gone to see him in concert, if the tickets hadn’t been so expensive. But when I saw that he was playing at Shea, I thought that maybe the tickets were free, so I googled the concert the day of the event, and though it was not free, additional tickets had been released for that night. So, I was like “Hey! It’s historical! They’re tearing down Shea! We should go!” It was definitely fascinating. Though there were times that I felt like I was part of some crazy Manchurian-Candidate-esque stadium event (especially after John Cougar Mellencamp appeared and everyone started yelling “USA, USA,”), even I was touched when the entire stadium sang “Piano Man” to the Bard of Long Island.

P.S. My love for Billy Joel does NOT extend to a capella groups, which I hate, and who seem to share a love for Billy Joel. I’m guessing that my friend who hates the Uptown Girl video never saw an even worse video…For the Longest Time.

PPS It’s been so hot, I’ve been knitting wherever there’s air conditioning…the subway, the museum, etc.