Sock It To Me

Well, according to the place I use to discover what truly random and meaningless holiday it is, today is No Socks Day. What exactly is No Socks Day? I have utterly no clue whatsoever so I will instead tell you what I think No Socks Day is…Why, No Socks Day is a day about wearing no socks of course. I figured the best way to celebrate would be to show up at work today wearing my khakis and sandals. After all, it was about 100 degrees here today. Unfortunately I wasn’t allowed to wear that to work and I can’t help thinking it was because I called my boss last night asking if I could celebrate No Socks Day in such a fashion. Oh, did I mention I called him around 10PM? I called his cell phone, so it wasn’t like I was disturbing him on his home line or anything. At any rate, no dice on the sandals and khakis.

I think it’s ironic that today is No Socks Day when socks have been so prevalent in the news lately. I have to preface that prevalent to me means two little back page internet stories that maybe eleven Americans including me read. The first story from last week was about how people associated with the Red Sox’s (is that the correct plural form of Sox, I wonder) 2004 World Series victory believed that the bloody sock from Curt Schilling’s ruptured ankle sutures was faked. Then, I read about socks again last night in an AP story. A man who has already been in prison three times for stealing women’s socks, usually by breaking into their homes, was recently caught again. Obviously, he has a big problem that requires possible psychiatric intervention. It’s just good for him that no one has socked him yet. Wow, that’s the best I could do? Sorry.

Since I don’t believe there is a Yes Socks Day, I thought I would take this opportunity to enlighten you about the history of the sock itself. Think how vital a part the sock plays in our society. Sports teams are named after it, Richard Nixon once mentioned socks on ‘Laugh In’ and wasn’t Shari Lewis’ sheep puppet Pork Chop, Lamb Chop, Prime Rib or whatever it was called made from a sock. See, when you really grasp for decent proof, socks are a big deal. They personally help me prevent blisters when I go running. Or at least they soak up the blood from my blisters when I go running, but that’s half a dozen of one and three quarters of the other…or something like that.

OK, back to the history of the sock. The modern sock was created by an Eastern European immigrant by the name of Leonid Sockolotovski (which I think is also coincidentally the same last name of Leila Ali’s dance partner on ‘Dancing With The Stars’), who came to America in 1847. Sockolotovski and his family came to this country to join their distant cousins the Hanes family. Because the Sockolotovskis could not immediately find work in America, the entire family had to share three pairs of shoes that survived their trip from the old country. To combat the stench and athlete’s foot (which was then known as farmer’s toes), Leonid knitted a strong, durable and absorbent foot covering made of wool. It caught on, his cousin Josiah Hanes figured out how to mass-produce the new garment, and the sock was here to stay.

I tried to update the Wikipedia entry for ‘Sock’ with this information, but for some reason I was denied access on the grounds of faulty documentation or some elitist, legal purely made up excuse. You’d think the fact that I was accused of ‘fabricating’ a story about socks would be a good thing since I’m dealing with clothing, wouldn’t you? Well, that just socks! Sorry, I couldn’t resist.

As usual, I ask that you celebrate this completely absurd holiday as you see fit. What no one at work knew today was that I was celebrating with my shoes and socks off while at my terminal of sheer boredom, I mean computer. That is why whenever my boss called me to his office it took me several minutes to put my socks and shoes back on and scurry down the hall. I just let him believe it was because I had been sleeping. The sad part is that everyone thought I was sleeping and no one expected any different from me. I may have to deal with that slight misconception at some point down the road. But not today for today is a holiday.

Well, if my doctors would let me drink, I guess the appropriate celebratory beverage for today would be Saki, or is it ‘Socky’. However you want to spell it, please hoist a glass for me and take your socks off while you’re at it.