If last week were a fish, I'd throw it back.

It was one of those weeks when everything was more difficult than it should have been. The stress I felt when I didn't hear from Peter's surgeon after his pacemaker was inserted on Tuesday had a lot to do with it. Even though the operation is considered minor surgery, just entering a hospital poses some risk, so I was very worried.

The recovery days at home can be difficult too. We had a bad moment, for example, when in a gesture of affection, I accidentally patted his sore incision. He was already in an ongoing state of grumpiness over being ordered not to exercise for six weeks, and my "mistake" didn't help.

But the frosting on the cake came Friday night when Peter didn't turn off the broiler after taking out some lamb chops. Unfortunately, the grease-filled broiling pan was still in the oven and it caught fire.

Our lives were never in danger, but in spite of the fact that we turned the oven fan on immediately, the fire left soot from ceiling to floor in the kitchen and even made its way upstairs to the printer in our study and the Venetian blinds in our bedroom. My attempts to wipe up the mess only caused the soot to spread. It was a nightmare, and I still haven't finished cleaning it up.

So when we went for our usual walk Saturday morning, we bickered big time. We couldn't agree about anything, not even the weather. I decided we had to put the week behind us, and declared our walk a bicker-free zone.

We had a very quiet walk.