I was forced to read Stranger in a Strange land in high school by a teacher who was obsessed with science fiction, and made us do all our book reports on stuff in that genre. It instilled a deep hatred of all sci-fi and fantasy in me. However - the one line I remember, out of all the crap about aliens I was forced to read, was that line about the colour of the house.

Which is apropos of nothing, especially what you're talking about here, but it let me marginally join a discussion that is only very marginally about a science fiction book, but it does get my sci-fi quota for this decade filled. Woo.