Chris Rock Vs. Not-Socks

The Case For Chris Rock

Chris Rock is a good bargain: he's two performers in one. You don't just get trenchant social commentary on race and class and all that serious jazz; you also get an actor just as comfortable in a middle-of-the-road comedy like The Longest Yard as he is in a family-friendly computer-animated affair like Madagascar. So, okay, maybe what you actually get is Performer #1, whose work is compelling and funny, and Performer #2, whose half-assed work affords Performer #1 the leisure to create brilliant standup material.

Earlier this year, Rock tried to integrate his two sides as the host of the Academy Awards ceremony: he couldn't be so honest that he talked himself straight out of ever working again, but still sufficiently scandalous that Hollywood's most self-important crap merchants could prove what good sports they were by laughing at jokes at their expense. (Sean Penn did not get that memo.) But still, it was a valiant effort to integrate the two warring halves of Rock's professional personality, even if it wasn't entirely successful.

Now, obviously, we're not turning out for every Bad Company and Head of State that he stumbles through on his way to his next Escalade. But aren't all the boring, bad comedies worth it if they are all part of the process that leads to Bring The Pain? Can't we take the bad with the legendarily awesome?

The Case For Not-Socks

Throughout the winter, not-socks are probably completely off your radar. During the cold months, you're not wearing not-socks, because you're wearing socks; it's cold, and your feet need to be warm. But then summer comes, and things change. You occasionally want to wander about on a hot day with the comfort and arch support of a good sneaker, but wearing them with shorts and tube socks would make you look like a German tourist. On the other hand, going utterly sockless may not be an option for you either, whether because you blister, or because the power and force of your pedial perspiration is such that forgoing socks of any variety would mean you'd have no companionship for your wandering.

To put matters more bluntly: your feet are so stank, Dr. Scholls would only treat them by correspondence.

Not-socks are a clever solution to the monumental problem of sweaty, smelly summer feet. They cover just enough of your foot to create a buffer between your sole and your sneaker, keeping the sweat from accumulating in your shoe such that no amount of Febreze could evaporate it. But then...that's it. They don't stick out and pool around your ankles like an L.A. Gear ad circa 1988. They give the impression that you're not wearing socks with your sneakers at all, but only you, and your insulated little piggies, know the truth.

The Decision

Chris Rock is a very funny fellow, it's true. And at this point he gets around so much that you might just be relieved that a sometime standup with his ubiquity isn't a lot more annoying. I mean, imagine if it were not Rock but Carrot Top who was starring in the week's #1 and #2 movies? Matters could certainly be worse.

But Rock, as much as we like about 35% of what he does, is so hit and miss; not everything he does is for us, and there are whole big sections of his filmography that will never, ever meet our eyes. Whereas not-socks...are kind of indispensable. They're your summertime foot friend. They save all your special-edition reissue Nike Cortezes from smelling like a Doritos Cool Ranch factory. And they facilitate your telling the world the most important lie of all: the lie that you are cool!

The Winner

Not-Socks