Seriously, Where Do Those Missing Socks Go?
After a couple of months of hanging onto mismatched socks, most people will simply give up and find some other use for them. Crafty type people will turn orphans into sock monkeys or sock puppets. Non crafty types use them to dust or wax the car. Still others donate their mismatched socks to the Goodwill, reasoning that a poor person doesn’t mind wearing mismatched socks rather than no socks at all. (News flash: poor people also have drawers of their own mismatched socks they are trying to get rid of.)
And then, there’s the people like myself, who are eternally optimistic that eventually the missing socks will show up and can be reunited with their mates.
I’ve done a great deal of research on the missing sock phenomenon. There’s plenty of theories floating around the internet about aliens, black holes, and time travel; a few people even suggested that leprechauns or the sand man sneaks in at night to steal the missing sock.
While these theories are humorous and rather entertaining, I wanted the real reason why my socks turn up missing on laundry day.
There really isn’t a black hole
Socks really don’t vanish into thin air, you know. They merely go somewhere else. That somewhere else is one of two places, neither which is a black hole or another planet.
How many times have you had to untangle a piece of laundry that has wrapped around the agitator? If you have ever run your fingers beneath the agitator ~ this is the big paddle in the center of the machine ~ you will notice a half inch gap. Your socks can easily slip through that space to wrap around the basket support.
When I donated an old washing machine several years ago, I pried up the agitator and found nearly 20 missing socks. They had woven themselves around the rod, resembling something like a kindergarten art project. Now, I regularly remove the agitator to check for missing items. To remove the agitator of your machine, simply pry up the agitator cap, unscrew the nut and bolt, and gently tug straight up. It’s that simple.
The second place missing socks tend to go is really quite logical, when you think about it.
Socks are staticky little buggers. They stick to other clothing like glue, especially when run through the dryer. Socks can disappear up the sleeves of tee shirts, in pant legs, or in the fitted corners of your sheets. They also attach themselves to velcro strips and towels. When they disappear in another article of clothing, especially something that doesn’t get worn that often, it could be months before you discover the missing sock.
The best way to prevent those socks from playing hide and seek in the laundry, is to wash them in a lingerie bag.
Socks aren’t the only items that can go missing
Socks aren’t the only thing that disappear in the wash. Hankies, bandannas, and underwear can also go missing, to resurface under the agitator or other odd locations. Underwear is particularly fond of turning up in places where it shouldn’t be.
A couple of years ago, I lost a piece of lingerie; it had disappeared while doing a load of bright colors. I had shaken out the clothes, and examined everything quite carefully but it had simply vanished. The lingerie eventually did turn up 8 months later, attached to the velcro hood fastener on the back of my daughter’s school coat. Naturally, I didn’t notice my daughter had been wearing my underwear on her back, until after she got home from school that day.
I blame leprechauns for that little stunt. That, or aliens from another planet.
