Note to self: This is how to set up nicer Emacs appearance.

In .emacs:

;; Color theme.
(require 'color-theme)
(if window-system
    (color-theme-deep-blue)
    (color-theme-arjen))

In .Xresources:

Emacs.font: Monospace-11

Fonts can also be set from within Emacs itself, but putting it in .Xresources allows you to break your .emacs without losing the font size. Do a xrdb -merge .Xresources to use this in a running X window session.

Update Emacs 24 comes with a new built-in theme system. [http://batsov.com/articles/2012/02/19/color-theming-in-emacs-reloaded/]