INCREASINGLY, the illusive concept of happiness is the subject of science.

Grim business but somebody has to do it. According to You – not you, madam; You, a magazine of that name – Cassie Holmes, lecturer at the Yoonie of California, Los Angeles, runs a course called Applying the Science of Happiness to Life Design. I see.

Here, inmates are forced to write “gratitude letters”, perform “random acts of kindness” to strangers, and undergo “digital detoxes”, with no checking phones for six hours. Crivvens, even Kim Jong-un hasn’t gone that far.

Now, Prof Holmes has a book out here called Happier Hour: How to Spend Your Time for a Better, More Meaningful Life. Its theme: time is of the essence. The author advises finding between two and five hours a day that are completely within your control, “discretionary time” where your happiness is in your own hands.


Robert McNeil: Exhibitionists such as cyclists and joggers should be arrested


If you can’t find that time, she recommends “bundling” chores, for example combining the commute with a podcast or the ironing with a TV programme. The key is not to let time slip miserably away. Use it all.

Even routine tasks can be turned into rituals, making them “more special”. Might be something in that. Recall last week’s explosive column about the meditative possibilities in shoe polishing.

Elsewhere this week, Heather Small, formerly lead singer with yon M People, said being happy had been her best revenge against critics. Now in her 50s, Small says: “If you’re happy, success will follow. It’s all about keeping fit and healthy and practising mindfulness.” Yep, knew there’d be snags.

I’m trying to figure out if being unhappy made me unsuccessful, or if being unsuccessful made me unhappy. And when I say “unsuccessful”, I just mean in life generally.

I mustn’t smother my pudding in eggs. I remember feeling mildly joyous once, when my footer team won the cup, which it does every 100 years. I confess also that animated cartoons sometimes make me happy. Then it’s back to reality.

One of the happiest days of my life turned out one of the worst, when the gods got to hear about it. Moral: never be happy, because you know They’ll spoil it. It’s the nature of life on Earth.

You drive an hour without encountering another vehicle, then see a sign saying, “Danger: narrow bridge”. That’s exactly when another car appears from the opposite direction. That’s life. Every. Single. Time.

In a desperate hurry, you always get stuck behind a slow driver, with nowhere to overtake. Always. You pass an object in your house every day for years. Then, when you need it, it isn’t there. It’s never there.

You need to be at the top of your game tomorrow, so you get little sleep and wake up foggy-brained. Every. Single. Time. You think you’re getting over an illness at last, then it comes back worse. You … well, you get the picture.

Life is designed to make you unhappy. It’s not bad luck. It’s design. And afterwards, having been herded into the reincarnation pen, we’re judged by how we reacted to these fatuous irritations and whether we can progress to a better world, one without cyclists and rap music, or whether we must return to this appalling laboratory to go through it all again: this time as a donkey.


Robert McNeil: There's a moose loose in the Westminster Hoose


But we can defy the gods by braying merrily in the face of it all, by not playing along, not letting it get to us. It’s just a matter of willpower and alcohol. Also whistling. Don’t let life get you down, folks. Boot it up the bahookey. Change your football team. Polish your shoes.

But don’t write “gratitude letters” or perform “random acts of kindness” to strangers. That’s taking things too far.

Keep your hair on

MY attention has been drawn to an imbroglio involving Willy and Harold, princelings of this realm.

In particular, Harold of that ilk has spoken up for “beard people”. Only they, says the Marxist-Leninist activist, will understand his standing up to Willy, who wanted him to discard the whiskers before his wedding. They would, averred Willy, bring disgrace upon the military uniform he’d opted to wear.

But Harold told Willy his intended, Megs, would not recognise him without his beard. Speaking as a beard person, I’m with H on this. I wouldn’t recognise myself without a beard.

I’ve told you about the time that, on an island where few people knew me, I shaved off my beard, only to find my phizog inhabited by a squatter with a chin cleft like the Grand Canyon. It looked like I’d a buttock on the bottom of my face, or indeed a bottom on the buttock of my face.

Harold’s problem might have been solved if, instead of military uniform, he’d worn a baggy grey tracksuit with the words Matalan Stylin’ on it.

Interestingly – work with me on this – in his new memoir, Ah Hate Yees A’, Harry muses as to whether his beard was “Freudian: beard as security blanket” or “Jungian: beard as mask”. Was with you on the chin, mate. But you’re going right over my head now.

A question of quibbling

A Which? study shows customers could save up to £261 by haggling with their broadband, TV or mobile providers. It’s shameful. Every year, these crooks hike their prices. But haggling is not the British way. Rewarding loyalty by ripping you off is very much the British way.

Batty bonus

Will Batman haggle over his car insurance? Car leasing comparison site Moneyshake says insuring the Batmobile would cost £21,000 a year, three times what James Bond would pay. But what about Batman’s no claims bonus? That’s the bonus you never get paid but which rewards your lack of claims with a massive fee hike.

Cheap date

In the cost-of-living crisis (c. 7,000 BC to present), potential dates are put off by invitations to fancy restaurants because they fear being “financially incompatible”. Even if they do go for a meal, putative partners are deemed more attractive if they use a coupon to settle the bill. O tempora o mores.

Rich pickings

Rich dieters can undertake a slimming programme at The Vienna Recovery in yonder Austria – for £75,000 a week. The facility attracts “high net worth and high profile individuals” who, in our view, should be caught in nets and trussed up in straitjackets. That would soon get the weight off.

Some flesh air

A ramblers’ group called Stark Trekkers is wandering the English countryside naked. The peculiar body’s scuddy perambulations finish up at a tearoom or pub where, thankfully, the law demands they be clothed. But imagine decent ratepayers’ shock on encountering these exhibitionists in the wild. Two conditions of civilised hiking: no wobbling; no dangling.