If there’s one thing in life that I love, it’s putting on a pair of brand new socks. They’re just as comfortable as a pair of old, worn-out tennis shoes. Brand-new, clean socks are thick, soft & cushiony, and make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.
On the flip side of this, I dislike matching my socks together when I’m putting laundry away. Gold toes, grey toes, grey bottoms, green stripes, Nikes, Adidas, black socks, white socks, grey socks, brown socks, tall socks, short socks, medium socks, tube socks, crew socks, worn socks, new socks. There’s just too many combinations, and I often find myself setting large numbers of single socks aside from each load of unfolded laundry so that I might find a mate for each as I fold my way through the basket.
Maybe it’s a little Monk-ish, but it would drive me crazy to wear a worn-out gold toe sock with a newer green stripe sock all day. To remedy this pet-peeve of mine, I have come up with a truly bacheloresque solution:
I keep two types of socks: white short and white crew. When enough of my socks wear out, I throw them all away and buy an entire set of completely new socks. Regardless of the condition of even the nicest of pairs…you know, those ones that get stashed at the back of the drawer and rarely meet a set of insoles…no matter how “nice” they are, they go in the trash with the rest.
I don’t think this is eccentric behavior in the least, nor do I find it wasteful. It’s an annoyance, and if it means spending $30 at Sam’s Club on 30 pairs of new socks (20 crew, 10 no-show) every nine months or so, well so be it. Contrast this behavior with my white t-shirts, and well, let’s just say I’m still wearing to work every day the same pitted-out white tees that I bought when I started in January 2005.
Is this compulsive behavior? What are some of your similar pet-peeves?