Insane

If I have not received the clinical diagnosis of insanity, I probably should.  I got some kind of burr up my butt recently and decided I needed a new color on my living room walls.  The beautiful Toffee Crunch (that I affectionately called "Butterscotch Milk") was in perfect shape and still looked nice and yummy.  However, because we had added some artwork and a few other things in there and throughout the first floor, I felt the color was becoming competitive.  I have long considered a more neutral taupe in there, especially with the achingly gorgeous "Mountain Stream" blue in the dining room and the more unremarkable sage green in the TV room.

Last weekend, I looked at paint colors at a big box home improvement store.  I grabbed a handful of neutral taupes ranging from greenish to grayish to pinkish to brownish.  I took them home and taped them to my walls to see what worked and what didn't.  It didn't take long to eliminate all but three, then I moved down to two.  I stuck the strips behind furniture to see how it worked with those colors, behind paintings to check it with those, on different walls in different light, and then I narrowed it to the one:  Potter's Clay.  I even liked the name.  I let it hang for a couple of days so I could look at it in sunlight, when the sky was overcast, in the dawn and in the twilight.  I love the way paint colors change throughout the day but I also want to like them when they do.

The paint card hung for a couple of days when I realized it looked a lot like another color I've used in my house.  I pulled it off the wall and carried it to the downstairs bathroom and found I had managed to find the almost identical color to the one I used in there that was called "Whippet."  So if anyone is wondering, Whippet and Potter's Clay are basically the same.  I could have done all the research I needed while sitting on the toilet.

So here was the paint plan.  We were going to be busy on Saturday with a graduation party and dominoes with friends, plus we had bookwork to catch up.  I scheduled a day of vacation Monday where I was really hoping to chill and play a little, so that left Sunday.  But I woke up on Saturday with a stiff neck and a sore shoulder, and could barely move or turn my head.  I medicated it and put some heat on it, but worried it would interfere with my painting plan.

I woke up Sunday with the same pain, but determination overruled common sense.  We went out and bought the paint and I told myself that if I started painting, it would probably loosen up.  I started cutting in the walls which is a challenge when you can't look up.  Bifocals require an even bigger stretch, but I pushed on.

This is where the insanity comes in.  I had to work painfully slow because of...well...the pain, but I kept at it.  It took all day for me to cut in and then paint the room, but I was too stubborn to quit.  The reason?  I didn't want to paint on my vacation day.  Laying around smelling of Ben-Gay is okay, but painting is out.  It would go against my paint plan.

The end result is the room is done, it looks fabulous, and I'm glad I did it.  Tomorrow I'll rehang the art and enjoy the full effect.  And the room will be clean because while I had the furniture moved away from the walls, I washed the curtains and the wood floors.  I told you -- insane!  But at least the only thing I'll be painting on my day off is my toenails.