So a supermarket in Stornoway will open seven days a week from November 17. Shock, horror.
Yet a nearby filling station has been open seven days for the last 21 years – as are most bars and restaurants.
Other businesses are open but have sent no press releases. No sign of fire and brimstone.
Ferries and planes are in and out on Sundays, yet some media outlets are agog at Tesco “challenging the Wee Frees”.
Here’s the real news. The Wee Frees I have spoken to recently, in an unofficial unattributable capacity, don’t give a toss.
Everyone hates hypocritical islanders on the Stornoway Tesco saga
Various denominations’ spokespeople and certain newspapers’ regular correspondents utter varying degrees of regret, although none that I have heard of has threatened vengeance from an aggrieved Almighty – a welcome change since seven-day ferries began in 2009.
I recently did a video podcast on this with the Moderator of the Church of Scotland. Rev Calum Macleod smiled throughout. Where the heck were promises of plagues of locusts and pestilence, whatever that is, to get our viewing figures up?
What everyone here hates is mainlanders, who choose to live in Sabbath-breaking communities, telling islanders to oppose Sunday opening. Shut up, hypocrites.
A friend has been pointing out that Romans 14.5 says Sabbath observance, whether on a Saturday or a Sunday, is not for everyone.
“One man esteemeth one day above another: another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man be fully persuaded in his own mind.”
Oh, that’s alright then. So God is cool with it, whatever we do. So, bible-believing Sabbatarians, do you believe this bit in the bible, or not?
Meanwhile, I believe some people just do incredible feats of bravery, like those of yore.
Flora Macdonald, in 1746, helped Bonnie Prince Charlie escape Scotland after the Battle of Culloden. Aged just 24, she disguised the prince as a dame and took him by boat from Uist to Skye, an event recalled in the Skye Boat song.
Flora was put in the Tower of London. Released the following year, she emigrated to North Carolina with her husband but returned to Scotland in 1779. She died in 1790 and is buried on Skye.
William Wallace, of course, started out as an outlaw. He eventually became an army commander, and won a victory over the English at Stirling Bridge in 1297 but was executed as a traitor in London in 1305. Yet memorials to him are scattered throughout Scotland.
Men who got onto Rockall were heroic
Men who got onto Rockall for however long were heroic. From navy personnel in 1955, Tom McClean in 1985, record holder Nick Hancock in 2014, and Cam Cameron in May last year, they defied the elements.
Only five people are officially credited with having been on Rockall, I know another two here in Stornoway who are in no record books for that but were on the rock, did a jig or two, sang a Gaelic song or two badly, and stepped off again.
Not all heroes wear capes, some wear yellow wellies and souwesters. Did I mention that a new documentary is about to come out about some of those rock clamberers?
Look out for rockalldoc which will be on a TV screen, or maybe a computer screen near you, very soon.
It’s also important to remember that you do not have to be brave to suffer. I discovered that 10 days ago in Edinburgh when I was taken to a swanky sushi restaurant.
Sushi is yummy, it’s the best. That combination of prawns, and salmon with rice all wrapped in vine leaves …
Soy sauce, sir? Of course.
There’s a green paste on my plate. I scooped it up and applied it to a kingly prawn and popped it into the Maciver kisser. Well, if I did, I thought the world was coming to an end.
It was wasabi, hotter than English mustard. Searing heat made its way down my throat and up my nose. I coughed and spluttered and tears ran down my face. Other liquids oozed from my nose and eventually appeared in my reddened eyes. Other patrons looked on, like my daughter, pitifully. I had found a glass of water so what else could anyone do – except enjoy the show?
There is a story that a Wee Free minister decided to skip church one Sunday morning and go play golf.
He told his assistant that he wasn’t feeling well. He drove to a golf course in Harris so nobody would know him.
He teed off on the first hole. A big gust of wind caught his ball, carried it an extra hundred yards and dropped it right in the hole. It was a 450-yard hole-in-one.
An angel looked at God and said: “Bl …., sorry. What did you do that for?” God smiled and said: “Who’s he going to tell?”
Iain Maciver is a former broadcaster and news reporter from the Outer Hebrides
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