We’re in the process of painting our new apartment. I’m living with a Scandanavian arctic creature named Poor Leno (right). He doubles as a human. We hosted a “painting party” last night and got one room completely done, in a life-affirming shade of green called Brookdale Gardens. Yes! Painting is extremely fun and rewarding for at least ten minutes. You should try it!

I’ll tell you what’s disgusting: primer. I coated my room with it because the infant named Jackson who lived there before had an apparent fondness for pumpkin orange, a color darker than my choice of Luster Blue. (I’d actually call it Dusty Violet, but whatever.) Let’s not linger on the fact that I’m moving into a tiny cube previously inhabited by a baby, and instead focus on primer being disgusting. From the first massive “roll” I applied to the wall, I was treated to a constant shower of tiny wet, white specks. I felt like I was in a commercial for a shampoo called “Primer.” It was sort of fun becuase I’ve always wanted a ton of cute freckles, but mostly it was disgusting. I don’t even know if it was worth the effort. Note to everyone: Say no to primer!

I love how I paint one room and I’m suddenly an expert on manual labor.

Here’s one cool thing: the color we picked for the hallway (a light sea green) is called Prairie Princess, and both of us are from Illinois, which everyone already knows is… The Prairie State! True to our roots, we are. Maybe we should make it a theme and stencil in some corn on the cob and the ever-obligatory outline of Abraham Lincoln’s head.

Since painting the rest of it looks to take 10-15 days or perhaps years, this site will be even lamer than usual (Exhibit A: this post) in the near future. Please stand by… and grab a roller and HELP us, with a backwards E.

Or leave tips on painting, specifically how to do it for extended periods of time without going insane.