Committee in Session
Aug. 7th, 2002 12:56 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rinueFor the past five and a half years, my family has been embroiled in the process of restoring Clinton House. That sounds a lot more historical than it is, despite the fact that we live in a historic district; the truth is that inestimably more time has been consumed in attempting to hold to Uncle Rex's absurdly perfectionistic decorating standards than was ever occupied in rebuilding after the fire.
Case in point: The Great Room. The Great Room is the space occupied by the kitchen, the booth, and the den, and it is currently a parchment color selected by Uncle Rex. As a result, it looks washed out and habitually under construction. Max, Stretch, and I have complained about it for ages. This has had absolutely no impact, because our votes count for nothing. However, my father came to visit a few months ago and said that he liked it; he felt it was tasteful and pleasant. At that moment, Uncle Rex knew it had to go.
We held a number of meetings and symposiums on the subject -- roundtables, guest lectures, and consultations of the ouija board. After repeated investigative viewings of West Side Story, we came to a consensus on Proposal 319: Electric Blue.
We felt pretty good about ourselves. There was a lot of patting of backs, both ours and others', and general pooh-poohing of the common man's assertion that we are disagreeable and pathologically contentious. We had an answer! Electric Blue!
Since then, it has become apparent that we all have vastly different conceptions of what constitutes electric blue. Stretch, it seems, is more interested in cobolt. Max has gone the direction of ultramarine, while Scarlett fears we mean neon. Uncle Rex has declared that he hates blue, and that electric blue is actually a color other than blue. This is something which he refuses to clarify beyond a blanket rejection of every single paint sample I've brought him.
How I managed to become the head of the Task Force On Electric Blue is something of a mystery to me, since I'm both the least picky and the least invested in the house. As far as I can tell, it has something to do with both having a car and the time to drive it to art supply stores all over the city (having exhausted the more traditional routes of home improvement centers) to scan row upon row of oil paints, watercolors, acrylics. . .
It has reached a point where I bring in signs, bottles, beads, fabrics, candy wrappers for the approval of Uncle Rex.
"That's not electric blue," he always says. "I hate blue. Electric blue has a life to it, an energy, a depth and focus! Electric blue takes you by the throat, strikes you in the gut, makes you excited to be alive! An electric blue can change who you are!" [I've cut the rant down considerably, as it would occupy too much space. I do have most of it memorized, though.]
I asked him if he had ever seen electric blue, and he claims that he has.
I think I will solve this problem by waiting until they leave town for a weekend and painting the room a color I like, at which point they will be too lazy to change it. This, I have found, is the only way to accomplish things here.
Case in point: The Great Room. The Great Room is the space occupied by the kitchen, the booth, and the den, and it is currently a parchment color selected by Uncle Rex. As a result, it looks washed out and habitually under construction. Max, Stretch, and I have complained about it for ages. This has had absolutely no impact, because our votes count for nothing. However, my father came to visit a few months ago and said that he liked it; he felt it was tasteful and pleasant. At that moment, Uncle Rex knew it had to go.
We held a number of meetings and symposiums on the subject -- roundtables, guest lectures, and consultations of the ouija board. After repeated investigative viewings of West Side Story, we came to a consensus on Proposal 319: Electric Blue.
We felt pretty good about ourselves. There was a lot of patting of backs, both ours and others', and general pooh-poohing of the common man's assertion that we are disagreeable and pathologically contentious. We had an answer! Electric Blue!
Since then, it has become apparent that we all have vastly different conceptions of what constitutes electric blue. Stretch, it seems, is more interested in cobolt. Max has gone the direction of ultramarine, while Scarlett fears we mean neon. Uncle Rex has declared that he hates blue, and that electric blue is actually a color other than blue. This is something which he refuses to clarify beyond a blanket rejection of every single paint sample I've brought him.
How I managed to become the head of the Task Force On Electric Blue is something of a mystery to me, since I'm both the least picky and the least invested in the house. As far as I can tell, it has something to do with both having a car and the time to drive it to art supply stores all over the city (having exhausted the more traditional routes of home improvement centers) to scan row upon row of oil paints, watercolors, acrylics. . .
It has reached a point where I bring in signs, bottles, beads, fabrics, candy wrappers for the approval of Uncle Rex.
"That's not electric blue," he always says. "I hate blue. Electric blue has a life to it, an energy, a depth and focus! Electric blue takes you by the throat, strikes you in the gut, makes you excited to be alive! An electric blue can change who you are!" [I've cut the rant down considerably, as it would occupy too much space. I do have most of it memorized, though.]
I asked him if he had ever seen electric blue, and he claims that he has.
I think I will solve this problem by waiting until they leave town for a weekend and painting the room a color I like, at which point they will be too lazy to change it. This, I have found, is the only way to accomplish things here.
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(no subject)
Date: 2002-08-07 02:21 am (UTC)Pantone 292.
You won't be able to see it there, their catalogues are about a hundred dollars.
But I'm sure you'll find electric blue there.
And honestly, Pantone 292 isn't really electric. It just gets mentioned in a song called "Reno Dakota"... by name.