I've Fallen In Love With The Colle

That would still be an improvement over playing the Colle

Vlado Kovacevic certainly disagrees. He has become a GM by playing the Colle and the London exclusively as white. And no, he is not a pawn stealer- quite the contrary: he is a very strong tactical player, and an excellent blitzman.

Aren't all GMs "strong tactical" players?  Anyhow, I think the Colle's dull reputation comes from club players playing it in a uncreative/sterotyped fashion and not from a GM somewhere finding interesting ideas in it.

That said, I've nothing against the Colle or its practitioners, and appreciate facing an opening that's (somewhat) less liable to devolve into a memorization contest.

No, not all GM's are tactical monsters. Nor all of them are positionally bright- I can mention quite a few examples. Kovacevic was primarily a tactical player, and despite that, he was a Colle/London man- I guess because he hated studying theory.

I still thing playing white against Petroff is more boring than experimenting with an off-beat d-pawn opening. What about Veresov? 

There is an Book at Everyman; I have been thinking about bying it, just to see if I like it. 

I see  

Winning some games in style over that irritating Sicilian, while in others going down in flames in simple theoretical rook endings ... 

You mean the Lakdawala book? It is not bad at all, rather well-written, but it has omissions and soft spots, because the author has not employed the opening before he wrote the book (his brother did!).

The Veresov is a good way for 1.e4 players to avoid studying the sicilian and 1...e5 openings. Most of the resulting positions are closer to 1.e4 openings than 1.d4 ones.

Perhaps there's a language barrier here, but I don't really equate a "strong tactical" player with a "tactical monster".  The latter term in much, well, stronger, though I feel a little pedantic pointing it out.  Anyhow, I'd ask about GMs that aren't "positionally bright", but I've a feeling that term will prove equally slippery. 

Anyhow, I think the idea of "dull" chess openings is probably deceptive.  For instance, Black seems to now regularly play c4 d6 d4 e5! with a view to winning the queenless engame, and of course there's that Capablanca guy...

Capablanca is the non-living proof that there are no dull openings- just dull chessplayers. His openings were "dull" at best, he played combinations once every blue moon, and yet, his games are of unmatched beauty, clarity and coherence. It's not difficult at all to play like that though, all it needs is being a genius... 

It's too bad if there are people who say the colle or some other "system opening" is boring, yet these same people also rarely draw when playing it or against it; and if they are amateurs, then I'm pretty confident that they do in fact rarely draw in them.

The point is that, although sometimes an opening advantage can be helpful (or not being in a bad opening position), most of the excitement of the game comes from the play itself. If Alekhine played this line against a computer, maybe nothing fun would happen. But if he played some master it's highly conceivable that he would find fireworks quickly, simply based on the classic idea of brutally punishing the slightest mistake. That strategy works at every level.

Similarly, it's easy to start with a sharp sicilian, then when you get out of book, make a lot of bland developing moves -- very typical in amateur play. And then the game becomes "boring" (although I personally don't find any position boring).

Interesting that Capablanca played the London, once in a while. The "boring" opening. The BoringIdiot plays it too.