Sundaysaresogoodthey should have two of them

Peace and quiet, empty roads on which you can go as you please, Rab is a big fan of the Sabbath – a day for doing a few tasks and feeling like a man before the working week rolls around again

Iam looking forward to tomorrow. Not that much is going to happen. That’s why I’m looking forward to it. And what is it? Well spotted, madam: it is Sunday. Surely one of the best days of the week. Sure, Friday is good, or at least Friday evening. Saturday is good, depending on how one’s team does at the footer. But Sunday is just so… quiet.

Early Sunday morning is the best time to be up and aboot. For me, it’s lovely to go into the back garden and experience something normally only obtained in Skye: silence.

That means no traffic on the road at the top of garden. I’m going to be hypocritical here but can’t help myself, as I admit that Sunday morning is also the best time to drive around the city.

You think to yourself: “Oh, why can’t it be like this all the time?” You look in your rear-view mirror and who’s there? Correct: nobody. You arrive at the normally busy roundabout and breenge straight on to it with a hey-nonnynothing coming from the right.

Sunday was traditionally a day of rest but that stopped with our 24/7 need for shops, about which I’m not hypocritical enough to complain. Apart from which, Sunday usually turns out to be a day of tasks around the house or in the garden.

The English writer Susan Ertz said: “(Millions) long for immortality who don’t know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon.”

It’s a good point, at least about immortality. Wouldn’t it eventually become rather dull? I’m not so sure. With the fear of death removed from our lives, we’d be able to chill out better and could probably adapt to staring at the flowers for hours or months on end.

As long as heaven still has fish suppers and fitba’, it sounds all right to me. Sundays are perhaps a little closer to heaven, particularly when the latter is defined as: “A place where you don’t have to work for anyone else.”

And that includes no selfemployment, which in practice just means having several employers and all the security of an autumn leaf.

But self-employment in the sense of tasks decided by oneself for oneself: that’s the ticket. And Sunday’s the best time to do them.

You can take your time. After honest toil, you can allow yourself a beer during the day. For a few fleeting hours, you can even feel vaguely like a man, before donning your tail and furry ears once more on Monday and resuming the role of mouse.

For some people, church is an important part of Sunday, and that’s fine by me. I like the sound of bells and the idea that people are singing and at least having a wee think about things.

But church is not for me, swearing lightly as I try damp-proofing the porch or repairing the electric hedge trimmer for the umpteenth time. But there are probably worse ways than church to spend your time (like damp-proofing the porch or repairing the trimmer).

There’s probably a case for having two Sundays a week and getting rid of, say, Wednesday. The world would be better for it. And we’d get so much done around the house.