Our earthly micro-pleasures

Getting your hair cut is a highly stressful experience which generally lacks any semblance of fun. For real men like me who are prone to visiting real barbers' establishments, and therefore don't have the luxury of an appointment, it invariably involves an agonising wait for your turn during which you're forced to leaf through a copy of whichever fascist rag is going spare from the awful selection of daily newspapers these places buy. Then there's the agonising process of being called up to the chair, where you're faced with a massive mirror, tied up in the big cloak thing, and then have to muster the words to put your order in. This all makes for a 99.7% torturous haircut experience. Awful scenes.

Earlier today, however, I was reminded of the micro-pleasure that comes at the end of every haircut and serves to make the whole episode worthwhile. The fleeting yet insanely pleasurable sensation that came when my barber Chris, 37, of unknown parentage, used the little electric razor to tidy up the back of my neck and remove the stray hairs was quite, quite incredible. His faintly ticklish and immensely satisfying vertical and horizontal navigation of the necktal region almost left me gasping with gay abandon. If I believed such things were possible, I could've literally died and gone to heaven.

This is a fine example of the type of micro-pleasure that sometimes crops up in life to provide momentary relief from the humdrum suffocation of everyday experience. It's extremely rare that a micro-pleasure is actually designed to provide pleasure, and nor will it make any great contribution to the plot of your day, but without them we would be at a great loss. The other micro-pleasures which almost, almost make my existence worthwhile include:

• breaking the top layer of biscuit clean from a Bourbon Cream before scraping the cream into the mouth with my teeth;
• filling the Padmobile up with petrol and manipulating the handle of the nozzle so expertly that the price on the display comes to a precise pound, e.g. £20.00;
• cleaning my ears with cotton buds ('Warning: Do NOT insert into your ear canal') following a lengthy head cold, and having to use half the pack;
• waking up to find I've been sleeping on one side for too long, and then rolling onto the other side and feeling all the weight shift across my torso. Heaven, just heaven;
• wrapping home-made sandwiches extremely tidily and tightly in fresh cling film (very difficult);
• employing a surprise Facegrab™ on yet another unsuspecting victim. For those who are uninitiated and unaware of what a Facegrab is, (a) "get a life!" and (b) learn here.