Few things make me sadder for the state of the human race than self-checkout at a grocery store. If someone had told me self-checkout was alive and well in Australia, I may have decided not to move here. I was too busy thinking about schools and neighborhoods to focus on the critical issue of whether or not I will need to weigh my own limes.

To me, patronizing a store and having zero human interaction makes me feel like Tom Hanks befriending a volleyball. Removing humans from certain equations makes sense (driving, anyone?). But when it comes to my food, it feels good to hand over my money to a beating heart, preferably one that is in the body of a smiling human. Thank you for providing me with this food so I can feed my family. Particularly in the age of online shopping, there is a reason I go to a physical location to spend my money. (I’m Miss Cranky-Pants, I’ll be here all week.)

Most days in Perth, I walk to our neighborhood grocery store, Farmer Jacks, to pick up a few things for dinner. Farmer Jacks sells six different brands of agave nectar, and employs real people who are lovely and like to talk about squirrels and roller coasters. But occasionally there are days, like today, when I’m out and about so I swing by Woolworths, a national grocery chain that has decided to trade in customer satisfaction for really cheap milk. “Look at those suckers bagging their own groceries. Who cares that they’re wasting plastic bags and dropping jars of pickles on the floor? We get milk from robot cows and it’s 56 cents a liter, moohaha.”

Standing in line for self-checkout feels like waiting for someone to step on your toe. It’s humiliating and makes no sense. My heart went out to the old lady in the blue coat wrestling with the scanner gun, and I am a chump for not offering to help. But, toddlers should not teach babies how to fly if you know what I’m saying. So I watched this eighty-five-year woman reach down to pull her Weet-Bix out of her basket and try to locate the little scan-able doohickey. It made me sad.

Finally it was my turn. I spent five minutes scrolling through the produce list trying to find the price for red bell peppers before I remembered I’m in Australia and they’re called capsicums. I hope that sweet lady was watching me through the window thinking karma’s a bitch. But of course she wasn’t. She was on her way home to have a bowl of cereal and read about Australia’s new prime minister.

I woke up in a funk. Different from the funk I had a few months ago when my throat was killing me so I took cold medicine and stayed in bed staring at the heating vent, realizing it looked just like the profile of a baby lion. And unlike the I’m-living-in-another-country funk. This was the funk where the people you love most in the world appear to be incredibly irritating and you need to leave the house as soon as possible to avoid saying very mean things.

I’m a pretty happy person. Granted I’m no Mary Lou Retton, but I generally feel content and grateful. But today I felt angry, and no it wasn’t a female issue. The molehills felt like mountains and GOD HELP ME WITH THE CRUMBS EVERYWHERE WOULD IT KILL YOU TO USE A PLATE WITH YOUR FUCKING PEANUTS.

Please, a word on crumbs. Why is it that I can sit in someone else’s home completely unaffected by crumbs, but yet in my own house, the crumbs stare up at me from the floor like tiny Donald Trumps, screaming in my face?

I called my friend Elaine and asked if she’d meet me for a run, warning her I was in a horrible mood. “I’m always in a crap mood,” she said happily. “Let me just get changed and I’ll meet you at the park.”

Grabbing my headphones, I left the house. This type of funk required extra consideration in the music department. Lorde and Yo La Tengo felt too tender, and Beyoncé only amplified my anger when I recalled her lip-synching at the Giants Stadium last year. I expected Johnny Cash to be a safe choice, but that lonesome whistle was not exactly blowing my blues away. The Beastie Boys came through of course. Don’t you tell me to smile, you stick around I’ll make it worth your while.

The friend and the exercise helped. Though dragging myself up the stairs to my front door, I still felt hazardous. So I turned around and kept walking. I ended up at the library where I sat in a beanbag and read a children’s book about a talking dog. I wandered over to the nonfiction section where the final selections of a Young Artist contest were being displayed. There was a bright yellow multimedia piece about the pressures facing teenage girls, and a very realistic illustration of a cat. I stared at the cat for a while, mesmerized by the details. Willa would love this picture, I thought. I felt my brain unclench.

I’ve walked home from the library so many times, I’ve memorized the storefronts on Rokeby Road. There’s the law firm, the shop that sells Eileen Fisher nightgowns and $90 throw pillows, the physiotherapy office, and the Moroccan café with the cappuccinos dusted in chocolate. So today, I was surprised to see a newly opened shop showcasing giant bins of dried beans and coconut flour. Hypnotized by the promise of artisanal pickles and macadamia doukka, I wandered in and bought some nuts. On the way out, I noticed the name of the store – Angry Almond.

When I got home, Dave and Simone were on the couch eating Doritos, watching Howl’s Moving Castle. Willa had gone to a friend’s house. “I bought some almonds,” I said quietly. “Welcome back,” Dave said.

Imagine Breaking Bad with all of the characters played by baked goods. Walter White, the temperamental perfectionist, would be a soufflé, and Jesse, a brownie. The part of Hank would go to a toasted onion bagel slathered in cream cheese, and his wife Marie would be a macaroon, preferably purple. The role of Skyler would go to some sort of bun.

And Gustavo Fring, the immaculate, philanthropic businessman who also kills people, would be played by the lemon blueberry scone from Baker’s Delight in Subiaco, Western Australia. It’s hiding in plain sight and it’s deadly.

The unassuming killer is covered in a sticky sugary frosting. When you bite into it, you get the sweet ooze before you’re hit with the sour lemon. The blueberries are there only to offset the butter. The experience is not unlike the Amy Winehouse documentary I saw this past weekend – completely wrong and strangely fulfilling.

The gateway was the free sample. I swear on this half-eaten scone that I walked up to the counter to buy a loaf of bread. But I am the person at the Stonestown Mall in San Francisco that says why yes thank you to the girl standing outside of Panda Express with the cold chunks of orange chicken on toothpicks.

I’ve since returned many times to try Baker’s Delight’s range of products. The date scone is decent and can pass as breakfast. The cheese and chive one could be less cheesy and more chivey but who cares because BUTTER.

Baker’s Delight is to a bakery what the Apple store is to an iPhone factory. It is a showcase for perfection, not a place to get into the nuts and bolts of how things are made. I’ve seen an oven behind the racks of bread, but airplanes also have ovens and no one’s cooking on an airplane. As they reheat muffins upon request, the young ladies behind the counter tolerate their Daisy-from-Downton-Abbey inspired uniforms, probably because they have unlimited scone access.

According to its website, the tagline for Baker’s Delight, a national chain, is, “We’re for real,” clearly the work of a brand management consultant who surveyed customers immediately after they inhaled scones. “You’re kidding me with these scones,” customers would exclaim. “No,” the consultant would reply. “We’re for real.”

Baker’s Delight lemon blueberry scones create a false sense of happiness and confidence, followed by symptoms of withdrawal and a craving for more. I guess the baker’s real delight is that she figured out a way to incorporate meth into her products, securing lifelong junkies. She’s slingin’ mad volume, yo.

I lived in a village in France in the spring of 2006. The name of my local grocery store was Attac, which, in retrospect, was a bit of a red flag. If you shop at a store called Bully, you shouldn’t be surprised when someone stuffs you in a locker.

The day I arrived in Thomery, I drove to Attac to stock up on essentials and got yelled at by three different people. I was pushing the cart too fast, I should have known to bring my own bags, and I needed to understand things more quickly.

I had been living in France for less than 24 hours and already I had encountered some of its more impassioned citizens.

Other countries take a bit longer to pull down their pouch and show off their joey.

I’d say Australia, or at least Perth, is a very peaceful place. Sure, the spiders and snakes can kill you. But as far as humans go, everyone has been very kind. I chalk it up to the sunshine and good coffee.

But two weeks ago, an old man at Jualbup Lake Park stole my brand new Camelbak water bottle and suddenly you better run, you better take cover.

Who steals a water bottle – from a gazebo, mind you – with “Bek” written on it in Sharpie? I’ll tell you who. An old man with a fedora and a walker in an otherwise deserted park. (Here I am tempted to make a “once a convict, always a convict” joke but I haven’t known my new friends long enough to gauge whether or not this would be appreciated. Non-native Australians can be sensitive about their origins. So I will put parentheses around this point in hopes they skip it.)

My day in the park with Moondyne Joe launched a litany of eccentric characters. A lady with large clip-on earrings and a pink scarf cornered me at the butcher to challenge my order of ground beef and lecture me on the rules of homemade hamburger patties. I walked to the post office and passed a man on the sidewalk who looked me straight in the eye and said, “you’re running the wrong way.” And finally, after six months of living here, I saw someone texting and driving.

It’s like San Francisco knows how much I miss her, and is speaking to me the best way she knows how. Message received. Perth may have the best beaches and coffee, but no one does crazy better than my hometown.

Living in Western Australia, I spend a lot of time thinking about sharks.

I also spend a lot of time hearing about sharks. I haven’t met anyone who’s personally run into a shark, but everyone has a friend who has a surfer friend with an escape story. Big Aussie blokes turn into tiny crayfish at the very mention of a great white. And when my “no worries” mates admit to being scared of something, I pay close attention.

Recently, one of the four Fionas I’ve met used the expression “a sharky day,” as in, “I reckon it’s a bit of a sharky day. I wouldn’t go near the ocean.” From what I understand, a sharky day is similar to earthquake weather: a little cloudy, a little quiet, dogs are pacing.

I started following Surf Life Saving WA on Twitter and now read posts like, “3.5m white shark sighted 100m offshore. Moving west.” I frequent a website that tells me to stay away from schools of fish “behaving erratically.” I have learned that I should be paying more attention to migration patterns of humpback whales, as shark bite frequency is directly correlated to whale populations.

A few days ago, I read an article in the West Australian called, “Sharks Not So Keen on Deterrent Tests.” You already know the story. But let me break it down for you.

In 2012, off the coast of Perth, great white sharks killed five people within ten months. As a result, the University of Western Australia received government funding to evaluate shark deterrents, everything from flashing lights to underwater sound machines. Equipped with candy necklaces and glow sticks, the scientists began staging their subaquatic rave.

The team soon encountered one minor problem; they couldn’t find any sharks. Apparently after their human feast, the greedy bastards were reclining on the ocean floor sipping cuppas and watching footy.

So, the researchers packed up their bubble machines and killer whale noisemakers and hopped over to South Africa where they found 60 sharks waiting patiently, ready to be tested. They discovered the following:

1. Sharks don’t give a shit about blinking lights.

2. When sharks hear artificial sounds of killer whales (their predators), their only thought is, “that’s a machine so there must be a human nearby. Yum.”

3. An electric ankle device serves as nothing more than a crunchy appetizer.

They did find something notable with The Shark Shield, coincidentally the name of my future band. The Shark Shield is a little box that emits a small three-dimensional electronic field, just like the one in that episode of Scooby-Doo. The field causes the approaching shark to experience what the researchers refer to as “mild discomfort” and swims away.

Here’s my thinking on this Shark Shield business. Shark encounters little box sitting in middle of ocean. Shark experiences “mild discomfort” and swims away, angry and sad. Shark spots human. Human loses arm.

I’ve read the stats. I am 30 times more likely to get struck by lightning in Western Australia than I am to get bitten by a shark. And I am aware of an easy way to eliminate the risk completely. But I’m a swimmer, and there’s only so much time I can spend in chlorinated pools.

Dave grew up in a loving but crowded house overflowing with cats, dogs, parakeets, snakes, fish, and gerbils. Early in our relationship, he told me he didn’t want any pets.

Naturally, I brought home a kitten. “How can you hate a kitten?” I asked. “She looks like trouble,” Dave said. He was right. Unagi was a monster. When friends came over, she would zoom in from the other room just to scratch them. She’d fill the house with shredded paper towels, and pry open the door to Dave’s closet so she could rip up his work shirts. “It’s because she knows you don’t want her,” I’d tell him. “She’s right,” he’d say.

When we drove from Boston to San Francisco, Unagi stayed behind with a friend who was going to fly her out later that summer. One day, the friend called in tears. Her father had just died. “Oh,” she sniffed, “and Unagi ran away.”

I had a dream that Dave and I were in line to buy movie tickets when Unagi, walking upright with a pink purse, strolled out of the theater. “Unagi!” I called out. She looked straight at me, dropped her purse, and took off running.

Years later, with Dave’s blessing, we adopted a nine-year-old cat named Bella. She had been declawed, which kept her inside and slightly fearful. She had the personality of a lopsided cupcake and slept on my feet.

Bella got very sick and stopped eating. On a Saturday night, Dave and I drove her to the vet to say goodbye. The doctor wrapped her in a green towel and gave her to me to hold as she administered the medicine. I felt her body end. We couldn’t stop thinking about our parents – Dave’s mother who died way too young, and my father who needed to die but we couldn’t help him.

I explained to Willa and Simone it’s a gift that we get to help animals die peacefully when they are very sick. A few days later, Simone asked if the vet stuck a sword through her belly.

Two years ago, Dave and I snuck off to the SPCA when the girls were at their grandmother’s house. We met a bunch of cats and narrowed it down to Frisbee, a nine-year-old couch potato, and Finn, a handsome two-year-old plaything. We returned later with the kids and, torn between two lovers, chose the younger, hotter one. We brought him home where he promptly curled up in the bathroom sink. From that moment on, Finn was family.

When we decided to move from San Francisco to Perth, we learned that Dave’s employer would cover the costs of moving a pet, thus triggering the behavioral economics phenomenon known as, The Absurd Shit You’ll Do When Someone Else Is Paying For It.

Australia is very strict about importing animals. Pit bulls are banned entirely, which is curious given the fact that ninety percent of the animals in this country would devour a pit bull for afternoon tea. Hamsters are also prohibited, I’m guessing because quokkas have a monopoly on cute. Over the past few months, Finn’s been pricked, prodded, clipped, and boarded. It has been confirmed multiple times that he is free of rabies, ticks, fleas and worms.

After Finn was vaccinated for rabies, he had to remain in the U.S. for six months. Our friends Nicole and Cho graciously agreed to house him, and they were kind enough to not roll their eyes when I dropped him off with three pages of printed instructions and his anal shaving clippers.

On Monday, after spending ten days in quarantine in Sydney, Finn boarded a plane with six dogs and flew across the country to Perth. The girls and I picked him up at Qantas Freight, a glum warehouse near the airport. I showed my passport to a guy with big arms who promptly disappeared into the back room. Seconds later, he reappeared with a crate covered in smiley face stickers labeled, “Finn Handler.”

Back home, we crowded in the bathroom to let Finn out of his box. Six months, Finn! We’ve missed you! Completely ignoring us, he walked straight over to his new litter box and released the longest pee I have ever witnessed. Then he rolled around in his urine and stumbled over to his food. Within the hour, he was asleep on the couch. Our little frat boy is finally here.