The water better be working at the office next week.

I should be sleeping right now. Or at least trying to sleep. My attempt to sleep would include wearing a certain pink fluffy eye mask that smells of lavender. I’d lie on my back and imagine my limbs becoming water like the Pacific ocean that laps at the sandy shore, just three miles from my front door. My knots would uncoil, stubbornly, and then perhaps all of the thoughts that run through my head and keep me up at night would float away, like little cloud puffs that hover above my bed, then drift up and out into the darkness that is Night.

I can’t sleep because I’m so damn happy. I wish I could attribute it to work stress or anything else, but I stay up late at night planning and getting excited about things. LIFE. It’s all happening and I’ve got to catch it before it goes by in a swirl of blurred colors, delicious scents, echoed voices. So much to do, so much to do.

But moving on: My work is having a potluck next week. Some of you out there might be turning up noses at such a thing as a potluck (snotluck more like it!), others might be like I once was: in awe. Food? Lots of different kinds? And I get to try ‘em all? I’m there!

Well, that’s what I thought last time my work had a potluck. I tried a lot of different foods then (ok, I only tried about five things out of 60. My eyes are much larger than my stomach). I had Jack Daniels meatballs. People RAVED about them, so I took three. But whoever made them forgot to cook off all the Jack and I couldn’t choke a whole meatball down. It was embarrassing. I felt like an old drunk as I gasped and choked for a napkin, anything to save me. I also had some pasta that had been sitting out for a while getting stiff, a delicious carrot cake and some ghetto cheese dip.

My stomach thanked me about 15 minutes after that potluck.

But I digress.

I got an email at work today, one of those mass memos in a too-large font with clip art that screams 1985. It read something like: INTERNATIONAL POTLUCK. Bring a dish that symbolizes where you’re from or your ethnicity.

Immediately I got excited, but then terrified. Looking around my very “cultured” office, I thought of all the shit that was going to be at this potluck. Fried chicken. Crawfish. Chinese dumplings. Polish sausages. My eyes darted back and forth, as though I had Turrets, the possibilities racing through my head, while my stomach churned in angst. It’s either going to be one eye opener of an afternoon, or what my Dad’s friend Dave likes to call a “United Nations Meeting.” More on that later.

I’m Croatian. I’ve got to bring some Povitica, or for all of you non-Croatian fools out there: Nut Bread.

I must find an Eastern European bakery in these hills of Los Angeles. The journey starts tomorrow.