Feel Good Friday - where's that sock?

[Barbara Szczesniak]

It's happened to everyone at some point. You put a pair of socks in the wash, and, when you put away the dry clothes later, one sock is missing. Where do they go? Does the washer eat them…or maybe the dryer? Well, today is National Lost Sock Memorial Day. (https://www.nationaldaycalendar.com/national-day/national-lost-sock-memorial-day-may-9)

I had a friend who tried to avoid this. She got something called sock locks (this was at least 35 years ago). Anyway, they were little plastic things she put around the pair of socks to keep them together in the washer, dryer, and drawer. She said it was because her husband was colorblind and couldn't tell which socks made a pair, but maybe it was the lost sock issue.

What do you do with your lost socks? Make sock puppets to entertain your children? Use them to dust the house? Wear mismatched pairs? Put them in the drawer hoping that the other one magically shows up sometime?

I think that today I will go through my sock drawer and see how many single socks I can put to some other purpose. Happy Friday everyone! 

[Matt Doar _Adaptavist_]

Funny, I was just going to say that I do get help from my wife to pair up socks, color blind

My problem is that each pair I have is unique (handmade) but one wears out first. So I save the odd socks and then sometimes I wear mismatched socks, just like the kids do

[Barbara Szczesniak]

@Matt Doar _Adaptavist_ handmade socks? Someone must love you a lot to do that for you.

[Matt Doar _Adaptavist_]

A friend of the family in the UK who uses a very old American hand-cranked sock making machine. Lots of fun to operate.

[Amanda Barber]

Oh boy, my 14-year-old will enjoy this day. She purposely wears mismatched socks - including a few new ones I brought back with me from Team 25! Sometimes she can't find the mate, but mostly it's a "fashion" choice. 

For single socks in great condition, we used to use them as erasers for dry erase boards in my classroom. Most often, I'd grab a cheap pack of socks for this purpose, but occasionally, I'd save really good-condition, mismatched socks to add to the mix. 

Now, I have a tiny part of my sock drawer for the singles that I hope to find someday. Every so often, I clean it out and donate the good ones to a local makerspace for kiddos to use as puppets or for the fabric!

[Matt Doar _Adaptavist_]

Best not tell her there's an old guy doing the same thing 

[Barbara Szczesniak]

@Amanda Barber Erasing whiteboards sounds like a good use for the single socks. And donating to others is always great.

[Amanda Barber]

Haha, @Matt Doar _Adaptavist_ - she's a pretty neat kiddo who'd probably love this actually.

[Stephen_Lugton]

Ever since my girlfriend insisted I was responsible for washing my own socks, I've used a cunning method to make sure that I don't have this problem; I only wash one of each pair of socks in each wash!

My problem isn't so much with single socks and what to do with them, it's with what we call 'Church socks' (because they're hole-y) when you have one perfectly good sock and one where you can see your big toe poking through (hole location not just limited to big toe)

[Barbara Szczesniak]

@Stephen_Lugton That's a lot of forethought there with the washing. It's been a while since I had any "church socks" (a perk of living in no-socks-needed Florida). I always hated tossing out a pair because of a hole in one. (maybe they could be "golf socks" 😁)

[Lori Brown]

We call them "lucky socks" - as in, if you're down to the mismatched pairs, you're lucky there are clean socks at all. And maybe a load of laundry is in your future (teenagers...) 

[Amanda Barber]

Haha, love this!

[Barbara Szczesniak]

@Lori Brown That's one way to put a good spin on it. 🧦(who knew there was a mismatched socks emoji?)

[John Funk]

Thanks @Barbara Szczesniak !  Shamefully, I tend to put them in the drawer and hope the other magically appears one day in the dryer (maybe it's been hiding in one of those tiny little holes). Or that I will end up with another single sock close enough to the same color that I could get by with wearing them both though they are not the original mates. 

[Barbara Szczesniak]

Not shameful, @John Funk. I generally give it time—maybe the other sock did not make it out of the hamper into that load of wash (or did not make it into the hamper because it fell behind it). 😊

[Ellis_ Kathy]

Hi!  We have two kittens that just turned 2 and they love to steal my socks - clean or dirty doesn't matter to them.  I recently sent my brother and sister-in-law a box with some fun things I found for them.  I didn't know until my brother sent me a picture and a note "thanking" me for the sock that the kittens had put a dirty sock in the box when I wasn't looking and I didn't see it when I taped it up to mail.  I could tell it was dirty...you could see the shape of my foot!  And it was one of my good ones!

[Barbara Szczesniak]

@Ellis_ Kathy Well, obviously, your kittens thought this would be a fun thing for your brother and sister-in-law (or perhaps for their cat). 

[Lori Brown]

They're just getting into the spirit of sharing. And they picked a funky one for the extra sensory experience. Good kitties. :)