Fifteen years ago, I wrote about “designer paint” in this newspaper. Folks like Ralph Lauren and Martha Stewart have their own lines of exotic paint colors — and why not? They’re all about diversifying their brands. Ralph and Martha have their fingers in every conceivable pie, as I believe the cliché goes, though, if I’m looking at the dessert counter at the diner and some kook has inserted a digit through the flaky crust of the raspberry pie and is stirring it around, I’m pretty much not going to order any. So I’m not sure why the “fingers in a lot of pies” cliché is effective. 

Anyhoo, our Financial People tell my wife and me to diversify, as well, even though our Financial People had to arrange a loan so I could scrape together an extra $500 for a Meet ‘n’ Greet with Slayer when they come to Foxwoods in September for the Revolution Rock Festival. Nothing says “thinking ahead, financially” like a Slayer Meet ‘n’ Greet. I guarantee you if Warren Buffet and Alexander Hamilton and both H. AND R. Block were asked, they’d say, “Yes, by all means, cover your financial butt by hanging out with Slayer.”

Or maybe not. Rich people, though? They know how to diversify. This explains why folks like Ralph Lauren and Martha Stewart have designer paint lines with dozens and dozens of poetically-named shades of paint to enrich the interior and/or exterior walls of your (presumably nine-bathroom’d) home.

This all takes on added gravitas because we MUST paint our house. It can’t wait any longer. But how to choose what color?! Martha and Ralph’s marketing folks make it so hard with tones like Martha’s “Mermaid Teal” or “Lightning Bug” or Ralph’s “Aged Whiskey” or “Rod ‘n’ Reel.”

Well, it all comes together. What I’ve decided to do is diversify my holdings by starting my own line of exotic paint colors with, of course, clever names. Can’t you imagine your child’s bedroom or the exterior of your many-gabled home luxuriantly coated in one of Trusty Rick’s Hues? Mix and match from colors such as:

1. Johnny Depp’s Gums

2. Smoker’s Fingertips

3. Donald and Hillary Failed-Lie-Detector-Distortion Red

4. Landfill Detonation

5. Winter Sneeze