Color confusion

There are four shades of blue in my office. Our bedroom has four shades of a different blue dabbed on the wall. The bathroom is a riot of try-out shades and none of the colors Jeff liked work in his office. I have paint on my fingernails and probably in my hair. I wish an interior decorator would show up and say, "Yes! This is the perfect color!"

I think I've lived in a white wall environment for far too long.

My friend Jimmy, an architect, has two bits of wisdom he's been repeating to me since we were 18:
1. Don't be afraid of color. (He's right on this.)
2. Don't destroy the natural beauty of the hand with rings. (He's wrong on this one.)

Does anyone know how you can tell from a swatch on the wall what the full-room color is really going to look like? Also, if anyone wants to come over and choose the colors for us, I'll cook dinner and that includes chocolate mousse for dessert.

On a related problem. I seem to be destroying my keyboards at a tremendous rate. I type so fast and so hard that I wear out the letters on the keyboard in weeks. Does anyone else have this problem?