When I was young I was a sailor and as such had to have perfect vision, presumably so one could spot an iceberg before it splintered the walls of the mess room and transformed your hot tomato soup into ice-cold gazpacho. Of late, however, I have developed blind spots that occasionally prove embarrassing.

For instance, a few months ago I sprayed my underarms with what I assumed to be anti-perspirant and was about to do likewise around my nether regions when I was halted by the hysterical laughter of my wife who, between gasps, pointed out that I was in fact coating myself with a can of Mr Sheen. It was not my most 'polished' performance I can assure you.

So today it came as no great surprise to me as I sat in the dentist's waiting room, staring dejectedly at my shoes, to discover that I was wearing ever so slightly mismatched socks; which discovery caused me to hastily hide my feet under the chair.

I was instantly reminded of the time many years ago when a girlfriend, who had caught sight of my hastily thrown on attire, pointed to my feet and observed,

"Jack the Ripper wore odd socks."

Dismay had flooded my soul because I was already aware that my photographic memory was a characteristic I shared with Adolf Hitler and so it seemed I also shared the sartorial tastes of yet another serial killer.

It was only when I caught sight of her grinning slyly that I realised I had been taken in by a serial spoofer.

My reflection led me back to my childhood when socks were near shapeless woollen bags, often hand knitted; some of them by my great aunt Alice who was famed for her uncanny ability to 'turn a heel' as she clicked away on four needles in the dark of the cinema. Even the presence of her favourite heartthrob, Clark Gable, up there on that silver screen never distracted her enough to once drop a stitch.

They were inelegant to the point of absurdity as they invariably refuse to cling to one's leg, preferring instead to fall about the ankles until one's shins resembled miniature concertinas. I am sure that at one stage of my life I imagined that the ankles of young boys and some very old ladies were composed of grotesquely corrugated muscle.

As a seaman, sometimes engaged in winter Atlantic crossings, I was compelled to wear sea boots, and thick white woollen socks that were worn folded over the top of the boots, in a style I liked to think lent me the jaunty air of an old salt but which actually gave me the appearance of a dishevelled village idiot.

In later life I have found myself comparing the mysteries of disappearing socks with the arcana of quantum physics because just as some particles change properties when they collide, so many of my socks have, after the merciless tumbling of the washing machine, changed colour ever so slightly, so that once identical twins are now half-brothers or even first cousins. Other socks, rather like the Higgs boson, (Google it - I had to) are known to exist but can never be detected by any means known to man.

I thought I had discovered the perfect solution to the problem when I cast out from my drawers every single sock I owned and bought two huge bundles of plain black socks from Marks & Spencer, working on the assumption that I would never again have to rummage through the washing for a matching pair. But I reckoned without the magical process wherein socks that I thought had been banished to the outer darkness mysteriously found their way back into the fold causing me both confusion and intense irritation.

As I advance into old age I find that more and more I share some of the needs of tortoises and other cold blooded creatures in that I cannot get going in the morning unless I am wearing fresh socks on my cold feet, where once I gambolled barefoot in the park. Well, on the grass in the back yard.

I can't help feeling that our intelligent designer was little short sighted for not ensuring that our feet and ankles were adequately endowed with thick hair.

Peter

Where are you from? England

Peter,
I got a real kick from this one.


How many times have we lost a sock between the
hamper, washer or dryer.??



Bob H.

Where are you from? Arkansas