A recent post got me thinking about ‘grey’ and ‘gray’, and not for the first time too. Did you know that some colour charts consider grey and gray to be two different colours? Well, I did not. I often find myself debating on which of the two to use, the a or the e. Usually I will choose depending on the letters in the following word. As in Gray Days I use ‘gray’ because it goes well with ‘day’. Were it to be evening instead of day, I would choose grey instead. Being a fan of Grey’s Anatomy (both the Medical textbook and the TV show) didn’t help much either, as I seemed to have come to the conclusion that Grey is to names of people and Gray is to colours. Don’t ask me, I don’t how I came to the conclusion; my brain seems to have a lot of that going sometimes – drawing strange conclusions.
Google to the rescue. I decided to look characters Grey and Gray up; I’m not sure what took me so long seeing as I’m the ultimate Google poster girl. Apparently grey” (#D3D3D3) is considerably lighter than ‘gray’ (#808080), and some people see grey as a silver-like color, while seeing ‘gray’ as a range of colours between white and black. British English uses ‘grey’ whereas American uses ‘gray’ although both will be found in usage in both types of English. I didn’t know all that either.
Warm gray, left; cool gray, right.
Now that all that is ingrained in my gray matter I certainly won’t be spending time debating over which one to use. Perhaps about which shade of grey compliments me better – of that I’m certain there will be some pause for thought.
Au revoir! Much Love,
Gray Days
05 Wednesday Oct 2011
Posted in Feature
You know some of those days that just don’t go right no matter how hard you try, or what you do? Read a fav book, read a humour column or two, eat some comfort food ( three cheers to Snickers, the chocolate) but all in vain? On those days, I just wish I had a spell that could drive away gray clouds and leave everything rosy and gay.
And as if the world were conspiring against me, the clouds outside are literally gray and dark, and they’ve been so for the greater part of the day. Is my day gray because the universe looks gray, or am I feeling gray because the universe looks gray? Is the world simply agreeing with me, empathising with me and reflecting my gray-ness? Or am I simply taking on it’s colours? Is the universe for me or against me?
If the universe is for me why won’t the clouds let through a few bright rays of sunlight to brighten my gray day? Why do I hear no bird birds chattering gaily away. Has the gray day turned them sullen and gray too? Or have they just taken shelter from an impending storm? Should I, too?
