Cell Phones and Paint Samples

Quiet has fallen like the Times Square Ball at midnight. Grand twins and Mom have returned to Pittsburgh and I'm walking around with something like post-traumatic stress, looking lost and wondering what happened. Life with children under two years old runs at double the rest of the world and when you slip out of warp speed everything seems to have slowed wayyy down, the hours seem stretched out.

And did I mention quiet? More so than I even expected, it seems my cell phone has gone walkabout, and daughter says it didn't follow them home. Of course I tried calling myself, it usually works, but this time it went straight to voice mail. Wonder when the silly thing will turn up? And how strange it feels to be lost without an electronic device. I don't have a written phone book any more, and have used speed dial for so long I don't even know my kids' phone numbers. So, family if I don't call it's because I can't find your phone number. Call me!

I worked today, setting up the lab for my training class tomorrow: Absolute Beginner's Computing, get it? ABC's of Computers-- so cute. Anyhoo, I'm even ready for the woman who didn't know computers had mice, it should be fun. I finished hanging the blinds today and updating laptops, hopefully everything goes well Monday, I have a full house.

After work I treated myself with a trip to my favorite paint store: Cobbs, right here in Warren. I think the poor man cringes when he sees me coming. Last fall I was looking for YELLOW. I wanted to do a Venetian plaster effect in two shades of yellow. He did convince me that a little yellow goes a long way, and I even read later that one should pick a shade of yellow and then step down two to get the value of yellow you really want. He's responsible for how well the loft looks. So today I show up with a picture I printed from the Internet of what I want to do for the computer room/library/study room. It's a color wash of shades of terracotta. Since this room faces north and east I figured a warm color was the best choice. I was picking up cream-sicle orange samples and he was saying, "Too yellow." He was picking out brown samples and I was saying "Too brown." when we tried to match the picture. Finally, searching for a description I said, " I want a color like terracotta, you know, kind of Tuscan warm. And then I spotted the darkest value of the color I wanted. I said, kind of like this one, what color is this? We turned the paint sample over and the color sample was Tuscan Terracotta. Spooky. So of course I had to buy it. I usually prefer to start with the lightest value and color wash darker values so I'm way out of my comfort zone here. The color is rich, and warm and DARK. I'll post a pic when the walls are done.