We've been in this house for a year, and it's time to paint. Let me state, for the record, in language as plain as possible, that this fat boy does not like to paint. I never have, and there little likelihood that I will change.
The wife, on the other hand, loves it.
My contribution to the project will be to go help choose colors (a task that I admit I am not suited for) lug the paint to the car, wash brushes, spread drop cloths, etc. I will also agree to tape off windows and such.
Any activity that involves actually transferring paint from bucket to brush or roller to wall is not my concern.
The wife actually prefers this division of labor, I think.
I'm pretty sure that these walls have never been painted. They are all painted, those that aren't wallpapered (which is a discussion for another day), in a flat "white." I don't know if it's ecru, eggshell, white, off white, etc. Who can say?
We have been discussing painting off and on since we moved in. I knew we wouldn't do it during the Spring and Summer, as we both enjoy being outside whenever we can. But with the girl's wedding over and winter upon us, with temperatures plunging into the '50s, it is time.
Earlier this week we drove to Livingston to prowl through Lowe's in search of paint samples. We had decided to stick with paint samples that come with complimentary colors. You know what I'm talking about...a strip of paper with three shades of the same color on them. We figured this would be a fool-proof way to pick wall colors and trim colors that would match, rather than try to match the shades ourselves from among the thousands of various shades that Lowe's is stocked with.
That may be a good plan, in theory, but the cold reality is that there are hundreds, maybe even thousands, of these three-shades-on-a-single-piece-of-paper samples out there.
After 40 minutes of poking about, picking up dozens of samples, only to wrinkle our noses in disgust and discard them, we finally picked a couple of samples, one in blue and one in some sort of gray. Don't know what we were thinking with the gray one.
The wife has spent a good amount of time over the last few days painting trim and walls in the samples that we came home with, and now it looks like a toddler amped-up on Benedryl was let loose in the living room with a paint brush and no supervision.
We don't like either sample.
The wife said that the question is do we want to go with an elegant paint scheme (which would match the antiques that we inherited from my grandparents), or do we want the house to look "lakey?"
What's really funny is that we catch each other staring at these haphazardly painted walls, as if the colors might somehow change.
Back to the drawing board for more samples. At the very least our walls will begin to look like some sort of psychedelic art project.
Maybe we should just leave it alone; that'll give the neighbors something to think about.
More to come.
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