I finished re-painting my kitchen in a mysterious color called Coastal Fog. Mmm.
One of my few remaining kitchen tasks is to sit on the floor with (a) a bucket of mud, a/k/a mastic and (b) tiles the same color as Coastal Fog, which I will apply as a baseboard. And then (c) grout. So a couple of weeks ago I took myself downtown to Nemo Tiles, on East 21st Street.
It took time and assistance from Vlad, a young expert, to find the right tile, partly because wandering around good tile stores is an endless pleasure; postponing the serious selection is therefore a necessary part of the pleasure.
Finally, I selected.
Nemo has a penchant for grouping its tiles into “collections,” and giving those collections evocative names, such as Alchemy and Altered States. And Fray, and Glass Blox. And Jazz Age and Yin & Yang and many more.
I didn’t particularly notice the names until I looked at the back of the two-inch square sample Vlad gave me. The name of the series, i.e., collection, is Notorious. Very adorable, ever so me. And the name of the color — which in Benjamin Moore lingo is Coastal Fog — is Private Eye. So cool.
But why was it that, until today, I didn’t pick up on the other color names in the Notorious Collection? In alphabetical order, they are:
- Femme Fatale
- Film Noir
- Leading Man
- Sugar Daddy
- Suspense.
Now I want to meet the person who has the same addiction to crime fiction as I do, and must have had a wonderful time with this assignment. I’ll bet s/he wore a fedora and trench coat while on the job.