Yesterday was gearing up to be a beige, beige day, one of meetings and presentations and talking, talking, so much talking. And not by me, because that would be a great day, me being the motormouth and all.

I showed up to the first meeting at 9, feeling distinctly uncute in a dumb, in-a-hurry outfit. The day, which had promised to be chilly, got warm, fast. As I removed my sweater during the meeting, I realized the shirt beneath was inside out. One of my superiors, noting my bedhead-hiding knit cap and thick glasses, asked if I was going to sing some hippie tunes on a guitar. Yay!

This was a meeting of several nonprofits and the office that provides their funding. This is a regular meeting; recently, budget cuts made it a coffee- and treat-free affair, lending extra drabness to the flickering-fluorescent, whiteboard, stain-fighting feeling.

This gathering was a bit different; one of our group was retiring so there was some potluck goodwill going on (thank god, complete with coffee). Flowers. Short speeches. But still, you can’t spice up a drab, windowless meeting.

That is, until the mariachis showed up!

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Until I moved back to Southern California, I was all pfft, mariachis [insert eye roll here]. Maybe I just didn’t get them, living in San Francisco. I’d seem them heading to my restaurant table in the Mission and I’d cringe, not wanting to do that awkward freeze-and-smile thing and scrabble up some dollar bills.

What a crank I was! They’re excellent for ramping up the whoopie! factor. I got their business card, so brace yourself, next time we meet up!

The rest of the day descended into beigeness once more. Later, while tethered to my phone and computer, gritting my way through a webinar that was rife with audio problems, I tried to manifest a wandering group of wonderfully cheesy troubadours to appear in my home office. But alas, I webinared alone without a group of men with awesome vibrato, belting out ¡Ja ja ja ja ja ja ja! ¡El mariachi loco quiere bailar!