# Household Mysteries, beyond "Where did the sock go?" **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [November 14, 2018, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497 "2018-11-14T03:55:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/21 "2018-11-14T15:04:48Z")
I will be looking for something and not be able to find it. When I wake up the next morning, it will be sitting somewhere in plain site. This happened twice this week, with my warm white coat and with the new, nice black pants. I don’t know if I find things while sleep walking, if I have sleeptime physic abilities, or if my new place has elves in it. ---
**Author:** ![ZipperJJ](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/zipperjj/32/211_2.png) [@ZipperJJ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZipperJJ)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/22 "2018-11-14T15:05:28Z")
I have a touch lamp that I got for my graduation in 1997, and have used it next to my bed ever since. It went to college with me, then home, then to my new house when I moved from my parents’. As far as I can remember, I’ve never changed the bulb in it. And since it’s my bed-side lamp, I use it every single day. A couple years ago I touched the lamp (remember, it’s a touch lamp) with a wet hand and the thing finally burned out. But when I put a new bulb in it, I found I’d shorted the whole thing, not necessarily the bulb! So if I hadn’t been so careless, I might still be rockin’ a 21 year old light bulb. ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/23 "2018-11-14T15:05:30Z")
What’s the joke about the family that had the same axe for many generations? They replaced the axe head X times and the handle Y times. Forgot the joke, but it’s something like that. ---
**Author:** ![Kimballkid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/b5a626/32.png) [@Kimballkid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimballkid)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/24 "2018-11-14T16:30:21Z")
I got a pen from a car dealership many years ago that will just not die. I carry it around in my wallet and use it quite often. Only reliable thing I’ve ever got at that dealership. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/25 "2018-11-14T16:42:46Z")
> [@TokyoBayer](#): > > What’s the joke about the family that had the same axe for many generations? They replaced the axe head X times and the handle Y times. Forgot the joke, but it’s something like that. I’ve always heard that as being Lincoln’e Axe; you know, born in a log cabin he helped his father build! How is it that when you think you’re out of TP and you bring a 24-pk home, there’re 2 more 24-pks in the closet, yet a week later, when you think you have enough for Cox’s Army and don’t buy any TP, you’re down to your last 3 squares? ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_McQwark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4da419/32.png) [@Steve\_McQwark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_McQwark)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/26 "2018-11-14T16:51:01Z")
> [@Sunny\_Daze](#): > > There are never any pens when you need to write something down. Never. I have bought a dozen pens at the store and put them all next to the phone just so I have some handy to write a note and they are all missing when I need one. I managed to solve that mystery at my house this summer. My 15-year-old son likes to carry pens around, flip them in the air and catch them. I was helping him clean his room and when we pulled the bed away from the wall to vacuum, there must have been 40 or 50 pens under there. I also found a couple dozen cups, plates, bowls and, something that looked suspiciously like the remnants of an aardvark colony. ---
**Author:** ![Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/malleus_incus_stapes/32/3293_2.png) [@Malleus\_Incus\_Stapes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malleus_Incus_Stapes)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/27 "2018-11-14T17:19:17Z")
When I was a kid there was the Phantom Pee-er. Every once in a while, the toilet seat would be flecked with pee. Only three of us ever used used that bathroom, and all three of us would indignantly deny being the culprit. The obvious explanation, of course, was that someone was lying- but I really did get the impression from my brothers that they were as baffled and annoyed as I was. I got into the habit of publicly blaming the only other possible\* source: an incontinent ghost. \*I initially mistyped this as “pissable”. The Ghost made me do it. ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/28 "2018-11-14T18:46:25Z")
> [@BobBitchin](#): > > I had a snap-on tool box that birthed 9/16" sockets, it made about 5 of them in ten years. I’ve owned/own several Jeeps, so needless to say I’ve spent a lot of time walking down the side of the road. You find lots of neat stuff on the side of the road, tools being foremost. And 9 out of 10 times\*, it’s a 9/16" wrench or socket. I’ve got \*dozens \*of them. \*That 10th time it was a Fluke Multi-meter. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Lucas\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lucas_jackson/32/303_2.png) [@Lucas\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lucas_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/29 "2018-11-14T20:19:33Z")
I used to do a lot of architectural drawings. Way back around 1980 something I bought a calculator that (among all the other things calculators do) converts feet and inches, etc. I have been using that calculator on a semi regular basis ever since and have never changed to batteries. And, no, it doesn’t have a solar component. ---
**Author:** ![jnglmassiv](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f07891/32.png) [@jnglmassiv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jnglmassiv)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/30 "2018-11-14T21:03:52Z")
Didn’t I _just_ buy beer and whiskey? ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/31 "2018-11-14T21:08:15Z")
> [@Lucas\_Jackson](#): > > I used to do a lot of architectural drawings. Way back around 1980 something I bought a calculator that (among all the other things calculators do) converts feet and inches, etc. I have been using that calculator on a semi regular basis ever since and have never changed to batteries. And, no, it doesn’t have a solar component. I think I still have a TI calculator I got in the early 90s kicking around somewhere, it lasted well into the 2000s but I haven’t used it since then. If I find it I’ll need to fire it up to kick the wheels a bit. ---
**Author:** ![Doctor\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doctor_jackson/32/32_2.png) [@Doctor\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doctor_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/32 "2018-11-14T21:20:33Z")
> [@jnglmassiv](#): > > Didn’t I _just_ buy beer and whiskey? Yesh. Thanksh. ---
**Author:** ![Haunted\_Pasta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/94ad74/32.png) [@Haunted\_Pasta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Haunted_Pasta)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/33 "2018-11-14T21:24:59Z")
A couple of years ago I was morbidly fascinated to see a dead squirrel stuck in the main, lowest crotch of our oak tree. I figured a hawk had dropped it or something. There was a small brown mass in the split between the two main branches a few feet off the ground, with what was clearly a squirrel tail hanging down limply. It was raining, so I didn’t go out to investigate further, but I took a picture and posted it on Facebook. The next day, it was still there, and the weather had turned sunny. So, I went out to investigate and found to my amusement that the “squirrel” was made of fabric. The tail still looked like a squirrel tail, but no, it was definitely fake. I picked it up and examined it and everything, feeling dumb for being fooled like I’d been but laughing it off anyway. Thing is, it was and remains a complete mystery how it got there. There was no other debris with it, so it’s not like some bird or animal was trying to build a nest with it. (It’s also a terrible place for a nest- if that’s what it was was going to be, it would be the most exposed, easily preyed-upon nest of any kind I’ve ever seen.) The logical guess was that it was a dog chew thing that somebody overthrew and landed in our tree. But… it was in our back yard, well away from the street, so there’s really only three possible yards from which it could have been thrown. And none of those people have a dog. ??? ---
**Author:** ![Mama\_Zappa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/71e660/32.png) [@Mama\_Zappa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mama_Zappa)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/34 "2018-11-14T21:45:34Z")
> [@Ann\_Hedonia](#): > > Reading glasses. I started wearing them after my cataract surgery last year ( but I don’t need glasses for distance vision anymore). I have purchased 27 pairs since then, yet I can never find one when I need them. That’s always the trouble when you have a spare of something. If you only have one, you keep tabs on where it is (whatever “it” may be) because you don’t dare lose it. If you have two… if you can’t find one, you don’t stress, you figure you’ll find the other. Until the day when you can’t find _either_. I’ve had things transmute. Last winter, I could NOT find my snow boots (where we live, we need them maybe 3 days a year most years). But I found another pair of men’s boots, which my husband and son both denied owning. I checked with a student who’d stayed with us a couple years before, and he said they weren’t his either. So I tried 'em on - and they fit pretty darned well, better than my own pair. ---
**Author:** ![pohjonen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pohjonen/32/423_2.png) [@pohjonen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pohjonen)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/35 "2018-11-14T21:49:38Z")
I have about six pair of reading glasses that I distribute at various locations around the house for those occasions when I suddenly need to see something up close. Somehow, over the course of a few days, they all manage to congregate together in one out of the way and obscure location. I haven’t caught them sneaking around yet, so I don’t know how they do that ---
**Author:** ![snfaulkner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snfaulkner/32/433_2.png) [@snfaulkner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snfaulkner)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/36 "2018-11-14T22:03:17Z")
> [@jnglmassiv](#): > > Didn’t I _just_ buy beer and whiskey? Damn things have holes in the bottles! And they spill out and/or evaporate away! ---
**Author:** ![xizor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xizor/32/102_2.png) [@xizor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/xizor)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/37 "2018-11-14T22:23:08Z")
Exactly 2 people use my bathroom, yet there are always 5-10 toothbrushes in the toothbrush holder. ---
**Author:** ![dwyr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dwyr/32/363_2.png) [@dwyr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dwyr)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/38 "2018-11-14T23:11:15Z")
My Neato vac failed to return to its base station a couple of days ago. It does occasionally get stuck sometimes. However, I can’t seem to find it anywhere. Possibly it ran away from home. Or the cat did it in. ---
**Author:** ![Missy2U](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3bc359/32.png) [@Missy2U](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Missy2U)\ **Post date:** [November 14, 2018, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/39 "2018-11-14T23:46:51Z")
> [@dwyr](#): > > My Neato vac failed to return to its base station a couple of days ago. It does occasionally get stuck sometimes. However, I can’t seem to find it anywhere. Possibly it ran away from home. Or the cat did it in. For some strange reason this is kinda freaking me out a little. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![seal\_cleaner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@seal\_cleaner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/seal_cleaner)\ **Post date:** [November 15, 2018, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497/40 "2018-11-15T01:08:58Z")
> [@Sunny\_Daze](#): > > There are never any pens when you need to write something down. Never. I have bought a dozen pens at the store and put them all next to the phone just so I have some handy to write a note and they are all missing when I need one. A few years ago I told my wife I wanted ONE HUNDRED PENS for Christmas. She came through. Ever since then they are never by the phone or anywhere else I would actually need them. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/household-mysteries-beyond-where-did-the-sock-go/824497.md?page=3)