Orange

Orange is the colour between red and yellow. It is the only colour that is also a fruit, and the only fruit that is also a colour, and the two have never been seen in the same room without being mistaken for each other.^[1]

The fruit is named after the colour, which is named after the fruit. This arrangement, known to chromatologists as the Orange Loop, means that every orange is orange because it is orange, and scientists agree it is the most stable definition in the whole of colour.

The Orange Loop

In 1962 the Institute of Hues set out to determine which came first. Researchers traced the colour back to the fruit, and the fruit back to the colour, and then the colour back to the fruit again, for nine years. The final report concluded that it was "one of them" and recommended a lie-down.^[2]

A minority school, the Tangerinists, maintain that the true origin is the tangerine, which they describe as "an orange that got there first and was too polite to say".

Rhyming

It is often said that nothing rhymes with orange. In 1975 the Rhyme Bureau offered a prize for the first word that does. It was won by a poem that ended both lines with "orange". After eight hours of deliberation the judges ruled that orange does rhyme with orange, and closed the matter permanently.^[3]

Uses

• Traffic cones, which are 94% orange and 6% cone.
• Sunsets, which use it for about four minutes and then return it.
• Lifejackets, so that people who have fallen into the sea can be found, and asked how it went.

See also

• Red – half of orange
• Yellow – the other half
• Sun – orange twice a day, briefly
• Goldfish – a fish in this colour

References

1. Tangerine, T. (1971). Which Came First: A Nine-Year Study. Institute of Hues. p. 1, then p. 1 again.
2. Rhyme Bureau (1975). "Ruling No. 1: Orange, Orange". Final.
3. Peel, P. (2002). "Cones: A Compositional Analysis". Journal of Roadworks 6.