Everyone remembers the phrase “sock it to me” which
came out of the 1968 – 1973 run of Rowan
& Martin’s Laugh In comedy show.  Suspicious network censors questioned whether it might have sexual
overtones, but the term actually came about after Dan Rowan was heard screaming
it at the wardrobe girl from his dressing room when his laundry, for the
umpteenth time, came back with socks missing.

During the Clinton
Administration, the President’s daughter Chelsea found a little black cat
wandering around behind the White House.  The President let her keep the cat, which they named Socks because of
its white feet, and the family never sought to find out how Socks became lost
in the first place.  Thus Socks the First
Cat became arguably the most famous missing sock in history, notwithstanding
that it didn’t have near the impact upon events as many other missing socks
previously noted.

In conclusion, if history is dignified by the
biographies of great men, it is certainly given an undignified jolt by the
history of the phenomenon of the missing
sock.  While there have been a few
who have managed through contrivance to temporarily escape this experience –
frat boys in loafers sans socks, warm
weather populace in flip-flops, beachcombers, and women getting pedicures – the
rest of us are doomed to suffer the pain and loathing of missing socks
throughout the entirety of our time on earth.  When Thoreau said that “the mass of men lead lives of quiet
desperation,” he was talking about the anguish occasioned by the missing
sock.  In fact, Thoreau also warned us to
beware all enterprises requiring new clothes, especially socks.  It is not known today how many socks Thoreau
lost during his 26 months in the woods at Walden Pond.

So ends the Faux History of the Missing Sock. (Loud
applause) 

Cartoon courtesy of Troutbend!