My husband accuses me of making things up at least twice a week. It usually goes something like:

Me: While you’re out, can you pick up a bouquet of peonies? Preferably in coral.. melon or blush would be all right too.. but I like coral best.

Graham: What are you talking about? None of those are colors!

Me: Orange then. Just find the closest you can to ORANGE.

Things got ridiculous when we went over paint colors for the house. I’d hold up a paint swatch against the wall to ask his opinion for comparison.

Me: Ultra Pure White.

Graham: Ok.

Me: Bit of Sugar.

Graham: Ok..

Me: Nightblooming Jasmine

Graham: Ok

Me: Bakery Box.

Graham: You do realize these are all white?I’m sure you’ve been there before with someone… when they can see the differences between shades, tints, and tones, but don’t see the point in descriptive differentiation. Graham’s given me a hard time about this over the years we’ve been together. However, the other night, I managed to get him to see color from my point of view.

Disclaimer: This logic usually works best with programmers.

I waited one night about five minutes after Graham fell asleep and then promptly woke him up (when he’s too tired to debate me).

Me: Hey!

Graham: Silence.

Me: Hey!

Graham: What?

Me: You know how you think it’s stupid that some of us like to differentiate between small differences in color?

Graham: Yeah.

Me: Well, what the hell do you think is the point of hex notation for colors?!??

Graham: (long silence)

Me: Well?!?

Graham: Go to sleep.*

He no longer complains. In fact, while picking out dining room chairs, I hovered over “orange” as a choice. He replied, “Okay.. as long as it isn’t traffic cone orange.”

We went with “White”.. as in #FFFFFF.

 

* My editor insisted that I change this from “Shut up” because he insists what actually was said was “Go to sleep.”**

** My editor is Graham so take it with a grain of salt.