Yule Like Me

Hey gang.   These are the socks I’m going to be wearing on Christmas day.  If you want to be yule like me then you can order them from my fav site – The Sock Shop.

JL

Puce Socks

A big group of friends went out to dinner last night and I decided to splash out and wear one of the Sock Shop’s Colour Burst Socks (which are selling for £2 a pair – a real bargin.).  My father always called this colour puce, somone told me that that is wrong  – but Dad was in my memory was always right so I’m sticking with calling these my puce socks.

John L

I can’t be bothered.

I live in a football (soccer for you yanks) mad land. Unlike the US where each sport has a specific season. (Cold – football. Sunny – baseball.) Football in the UK seems to run all year long and for the most part I really can’t be bothered. Except for once every two years when either the World Cup or the European Cup is on. In my two decades of life on this side of the pond these pan-European and pan-global sporting events have been the highlights of my summer. Except this one. The European Cup started this week – and England isn’t in it. They didn’t qualify and you know what? I can’t be bothered.

Still in honour of the tournament that in the past has given me so many thrills and disappointments, today I am wearing some Sock Shop novelty football socks. The socks look hideous but as with all the novelty socks from the Sock Shop they are of excellent quality.

When the Brits give me a hard time about Americans calling the baseball final “The World Series” when only Americans can play, I point out that Britain invented arguably two of the finest team games in the world: soccer and cricket. Then taught the world to play them and the world now regularly kicks their buts. As far as I’m concerned America should look at the UK as a cautionary tale and make sure nobody plays baseball or American football except us.

John L

PS I just saw that these socks are half off at Sock Shop. If you like the look they are great value.

Jealous?

I’m off to my osteopath and I haven’t seen her in a long time. Since I’m going to be standing there in just my underwear and socks the dilemma is what sock to wear. After see-sawing back and forth between outrageous and conservative I have settled on some Pink Panther Socks. Below is a photo to give you an idea of what it would be like to be my osteopath. Jealous?

This is one of the pairs of socks that The Sock Shop has sent me for review. Like all novelty socks they are a little low on the cotton percentage but at 60% they are better than most. Actually they feel pretty good and I think they look fab – but maybe that’s just my legs.

John L

A Close Call

Ok, I admit it. Before I began wearing a new pair of socks every day I already had a couple of sock quarks. It started when I made Stuff the White Rabbit for the BBC. During the recording of the entire series I wore socks with the image of Bugs Bunny on them. (To be honest I still choose Bugs socks whenever I have a really important gig.) For a long time I would only perform if I had a cartoon character on my feet. This became impractical, so over time I have modified my personal rules so that whenever I performed on stage I made sure I wore a pair of two-toned socks. You may laugh but like the Tim Robbins character in the film Bull Duram, who wore woman’s underwear to improve his pitching, for me two toned socks are essential for comedy. It could be worse – I have known a lot of comics who couldn’t perform without alcohol or cocaine.

So I had a lucky escape yesterday when I wore a pair of solid colour Dog’s Trust Socks to a gig. It was a last minute thing. The club owner had an act drop out on him and I pretty much just put on a clean shirt and left. I didn’t realise I wasn’t wearing a proper two-toned socks until I got there. I rationalized by saying to myself that the picture of the little cute dog constituted a tone but I was worried – it was touch and go. I’m still not sure if it was the sock gods or the magic gods but one of them let me slide this time – I did just fine. I promise I won’t do that again.

The Dog’s Trust Socks feel good and look even better in that bold yellow. 25% of the asking price goes to The Dog’s Trust a group that as well as finding stray dogs good homes also works to castrate and microchip dogs – something my Veterinarian refol says is a good idea. And one should never disagree with one’s refol.

The Dog’s Trust Socks are available from my favourite hosiery website – www.sockshop.co.uk.

Top Banana

I’m back from a fab ski trip in Utah. Thanks to the sale at a local sports shop I was able to wear a new pair of ski socks every day at a very reasonable price.

After almost 24 hours of travelling I arrived at Gatwick airport at 10 AM, went home, had a nap and then had to do my one-man show that night. I knew it was going to be tough so I wore a pair of Big Banana Socks from the Sock Shop. Despite my exhaustion I was quite wonderful (if I must say so myself) and I think a small part was due to these outstanding socks.

Speaking of the Sock Shop, Mikhel Ruia SC’s marketing director has graciously sent me a hole bunch of socks in the post. Soon I shall be reviewing each and every one.

Garfield Again

For those of you that missed it, I was on BBC Radio 4’s Midweek program last week. Midweek is a round table talk show. One of the guests around the table was Maria Ewing – a huge opera star.

I opened the show by giving all of the guests some of my old socks – washed. Host Libby Pervis said, “Maria Ewing is a world class opera star and you are giving her your old socks.” To which I replied, “That’s why she gets the Garfield socks!”

Ms Ewing was very nice but I noticed she didn’t take her socks with her.

You can see Maria Ewing (in her own socks) in the London production of Iolanthe.

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Mikhel Ruila, the marketing director of the superb Sock Shop, has written to inform me that any serious Garfield fans can don their feet with images of the fat cat by using the links below.

Mens
http://www.sockshop.co.uk/products/mens_3_pairs_tm_garfield_odie_socks1/index

Ladies
http://www.sockshop.co.uk/products/ladies_3_pairs_tm_garfield_odie_socks1/index