h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Ah ha! Maybe its refuge socks seek.If they cannot get on with their significant other, the sock monster takes pity on them and whisks them away to his secret abode.

I agree. This works for me, too. No degree of laziness, mind you, just a growing number of kids...

I buy all white ones, which in my experience are white, and then you wear them.

Right then. Perhaps a small, tasteful monument to a sock who gave its life in the selfless pursuit of the greater good... But jethro's foot is cold now

Let´s all just stop wearing socks, to show our symathi to all the abused socks in the world!

But surely our shoes would get all shmelly?

You can't please everyone, you know...
Maybe a professional shoe-airconditioner would help. Or you could wrap your feet into plastic.

I think probability theorie can cast light on this problem:
Imagine you have a drawer containing only complete pairs of socks. Now suppose one goes missing. Instantly you have an odd sock left behind in the drawer. Then a second sock goes missing. This could be that odd sock just created, but far more likely it will be a sock from a still complete pair of socks, which creates another odd sock in the drawer. So you can see signs of a natural propensity that can be confirmed by combinatoric analysis. Random sock loss is always more likely to create the maximum possible number of odd socks than to leave us free of things. For example, if we started with 10 complete pairs, by the time half our socks have gone missing, it is four times more likely that we will be left with a drawerful of odd socks, rather than one containing only complete pairs. And the most likely outcome will be just two complete pairs lost among six odd socks. No wonder matching pairs can be so difficult to find in the morning.
This is also another example of Murphy's Lw: "If odd socks can be created, they will be.
(More information on this subject can be found in Scientific American, April 1997, p. 72-75)

This of course is why it's best to buy many identical pairs.

Perhaps the existence of many pairs of matching socks could fuel the Infinite Improbability Drive

By making it infinitely improbable for a matching pair to be found--or not to be found?

I just noticed a couple on the road. Anyone lose some vomit green ones?

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A more important question is, when you get a hole in your sock, what happens to the bit that was previously sock? The laws of nature say that nothing new can be created and matter cannot be destroyed. Does this mean that socks do not subscribe to the laws of physics?

Do they subscribe to Escaping Monthly?

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I need to know a word in English before I can answer Andys question. What do you call those grey "Flat-Rabbits" (assamlements of dust and stuff) that seems to grow from under and behind the bed, or in corners of your flat? I've always wandered what they feed from, but hey, it's obvious: they eat socks... sneek out from their hidingplaces at night, into the drawer with socks, and take a bite where the toe usually is...

Yeah, I have those too. I hear them mumbling something about revolution back there in that corner.........

-B-

Mmmmmmm....I'm pondering!!!!

In Canada, those are called Dust Bunnies...

I also seem to remember something from the Hitchhiker's Guide about all the missing matter in the universe ending up as those styrofoam packing peanuts - perhaps there's a loose connection there?

"Loose connections" can cause catastrophic failures...

be careful!!!!

Dust Bunnies sounds right.
Do they grow from under the beds or do they grow from the corners? Do they eat more than socks? Would it help to get rid of them if I sealed all corners and angels in my flat with electricians gluetape? Do they eat other things that tends to dissapear? Like passports, earrings, chocholate and envelopes? Is there a link, I wonder...

If dust bunnies ate all the things that tend to disappear in my life they would be more like dust elephants by now...