Left foot, left foot, left foot, right

My mother always advised buying identical pairs of socks. That way you still have matching pairs even after you lose a few. Sock manufacturers have figured this out, obviously, because they sell socks in packages containing different colors and designs.

My husband says I need to spell out the meaning of the above sentence. I mean that the manufacturers want you to throw away the second half of the pair when one sock is lost.

I bought a pack of three pairs this week. But as you can see from the picture, the socks were not as identical as I had thought. I haven't seen left and right socks since toe socks.

When I took out the last pair of socks to photograph, I realized that the package actually contained 4 L socks and 2 R socks. So should I try to return them? I can't imagine how I would explain this problem to the store. In a country where large numbers of plumbers don't seem to know what H and C stand for, what would an underwear store worker have to say about the difference between L and R?