Unfortunately, after a month or two of running around in them sockless, they smelled like hell. My mother initially wanted to throw them away, but after I protested she declared instead that they needed to be “quarantined” — tied up in a garbage bag and thrown in the attic for a couple months “until the smell goes away”. I outgrew them before that happened, or course.

This is probably the origin of my borderline-pathological need to wear socks.