Their True Colors Are Showing

(I’m at a craft store to buy a picture frame and matting. The employee is showing me color swatches.)

Me: “I don’t like this combination. It’s not complimenting.”

Employee: *rolls her eyes* “Fine, what about this?”

(The employee shows me a pair that’s only a darker shade of the combo I just rejected.)

Me: “No, I don’t want brown. The painting has cool colors primarily, so these earth tones aren’t going to look good.”

Employee: “Well, the only other colors in this painting are red and brown. There’s too much blue! You want to go with blue? It’ll just look stupid!”

(Note that I am the one who painted the picture, which is a portrait I did from a photograph that contained a lot of blue on the subject.)

Me: “I’m the customer here, and I am the one who’s going to have to live with the matting choice. Let me see your swatches.”

Employee: “No! I’m the expert.”

(The employee pulls out a violet blue, which is nowhere in the painting’s various shades of blue.)

Employee: “Here’s a blue. See how stupid it looks?!”

Me: “One, you’re pairing a dark blue with a chocolate brown underneath on a very bright painting. Two, neither of those shades are in this painting.”

Employee: “Blue is blue! You’re not at a store that sells house paint. We don’t have as many swatches. You can’t just have everything your way!”

(It takes roughly twenty minutes, but at last I’m given permission to look at the matting color choices myself. I pick out two shades that complimented the picture instead of drawing attention away from it. The entire time the employee watches me, making rude remarks.)

Me: “Alright, this is the combo I want and that’s the frame.”

(I pay for both the matting and frame, but the employee has to get in one last rude remark.)

Employee: “Don’t come crying to me when you see how ugly you just made this picture when it’s done!”