For this post heading I deliberately misspelt “colour” as “color” so that American readers would be able to understand what I was saying. But I’m not going to do that again because it could turn me into semi-literate freak.

This not only plays out as an impulse to do purple art, it has gone further and made me behave in ways that society deems unacceptable.

A picture I drew of a couple of freaks after I mangled it in Photoshop

I once owned a really crappy red car so I painted it purple (yes by hand, and with a brush), I’ve also had several purple bikes, owned a purple bike shop, with it’s own team of purple clad sponsored riders, and have compulsively painted some of our furniture purple too.

(The poor old purple “Trumpy” on its last legs)

A not very good photo of our #1 rider in 1999 taken on a cheap camera

Like any compulsion, I just can’t help myself.

I know it doesn’t sound all that bad, but I’m a Kiwi – I live in New Zealand, the most colour phobic nation on earth.

In NZ, our national heroes are “The All Blacks”, and everyone dresses in black to look just like them.

Image

I once sat in Lambton Quay at midday, the main street in downtown Wellington, and timed how long it took me to spot someone who wasn’t wearing any black (the shoes got them every time) – 25 minutes! – I’m not making this up, even by NZ standards Wellington is very black.

After I took photos of strangers for 25 minutes, eventually an American tourist in an orange tracksuit came past but I dropped my camera out of shock and didn’t get a photo

And cars (again I’m not making this up) – a full 80% of NZ cars are silver, grey, white, or black (and even black is considered a bit too flashy). Kiwis just can’t deal with colours at all. So being into purple is like dancing naked in the street and screaming spank me.

After I waited in our street for 3 hours, eventually a brightly coloured car came past

Here is a photo of our hall cabinet that I designed and built. I’m very proud of this monument to conservative home décor – and it is of course covered in purple fur like any good cabinet should be:

I CAN’T HELP MYSELF – SPANK ME!