My socks are a mystery unto themselves because the ones that don’t go missing in the wash cycle, decide they don’t need a toe section and form holes to prove it.
But consider the washing machine. It is a sealed steel drum into which you place an even number of matched cotton garments. You add detergent, close the door, and subject the contents to high-speed rotational friction in water.
By all known principles of classical conservation of mass, you should retrieve the exact same number of items when the cycle concludes. It seems perfectly reasonable, unless reason decided to go on an extended holiday and went without socks.
Yet, every household on Earth is familiar with the asymmetrical survival rate of socks. One sock emerges unscathed, smelling faintly of citrus breeze; its partner has vanished into the non-Euclidean ether beyond the rubber seal.
Trousers do not vanish. Shirts do not split into parallel dimensions. Only socks, in their humble paired vulnerability, possess the quantum instability required to tunnel through solid metal.
It is entirely possible that missing socks are the fundamental currency of a higher-dimensional economy, being collected by beings who find our insistence on wearing matching foot covers unnecessarily rigid.
Fear not though, I believe I can present a solution. There are socks out there, that know how to survive. And no, I don’t mean those expensive socks with stripes or logos . No, I refer to those socks you get in packs of at least six pairs, perhaps ten. Those socks are manufactured with materials that may not be that sock-like to wear, but they have a toughness and survival instinct the posh ones simply don’t have.
So, I am now going to fold my socks together after they’ve survived a wash cycle. I got them from the market for a fiver. They have holes in, sure, but importantly, a big one in each sock for my foot. Note: I said “each” sock. There are still two, in pairs.