If we really can be measured by the things that make us angry, spare a thought for the people who get angry about things such as grass verges and pavements.

No problem is too small for many of the passionate suburbanites who sit on the committees of residents' associations. Uneven kerbs, stray sweet wrappers, the nocturnal habits of teenagers, the toilet habits of dogs - these are the topics that inflame their monthly meetings and AGMs.

It is easy to summon up a community spirit when the topic is dramatic - drug dealers outside the local school, perhaps. But only the most devoted neighbours will spend every Monday evening in a draughty community hall, and the rest of the week writing to local councillors, telephoning local authority officials or delivering leaflets.

The local residents' association, the community council, the community association - there are many names for these groups, but essentially they are the same. They are usually made up of well-meaning salt-of-the-earth types, who do it voluntarily for the betterment of their communities - as they see it.

It's easy to admire them if you share their idea of Utopia - neatly-trimmed hedges, lawns like snooker tables, party guests who arrive on foot and leave by 10 p.m., impeccably-behaved children. But if you're the sort of person who, on a whim, decides to start a menagerie in the back garden or to decorate the front wall with striking murals, you're more likely to see them as self-appointed busybodies.

Neglecting to paint the exterior of your house may seem trivial, but not to one south Dublin residents' association committee, who sent a delegation to the offending householder to protest. He immediately painted his home black. The dividing wall and pillar looked particularly strange beside the neighbour's whitewash. Another resident was so incensed by complaints about his scrap business that he retaliated by hiring his yard out to a motor mechanic.

A Dublin bed-sit tenant had a similar battle with the local residents' association who told him his social habits (i.e. occasional drinking sessions with friends in the small hours) were "lowering the tone of the neighbourhood". He responded in words they'll never print on their agenda.

But most associations use subtler techniques to change our habits and achieve suburban harmony. Even if it's only a polite notice in your letterbox, asking you to help in a "community clean-up", you'll be faced with a dilemma.

Should you give in and spend Sunday afternoon picking up sweet wrappers, feeling like a naughty child who is being punished? Should you confront them with the perfectly reasonable point that they are depriving road-sweepers of an income - and encouraging the local authority to be mean? Or should you walk past the decent folk as they toil outside your front door, picking up dog turds on your behalf?

It doesn't matter that you never asked them to do it - their polite invitation to join in is more effective than calling you a lazy, selfish, anti-social blot on the community landscape. If you don't display a hearty bout of "community spirit", you are made to feel like an anarchist. And, when they invite you to take part in the Tidy Towns contest, or attend a meeting, or join a crusade against some terrible problem, can you say you're too busy - and then feel guilty every time you spend an idle afternoon?

Many community associations - especially those in areas trying to overcome a bad image - seek to emphasise the positive aspects of their neighbourhood, claiming a better image for their background will improve the job prospects of young residents. But in fact the film and music businesses are littered with examples of people who came from dodgy neighbourhoods, while industry leaders, politicians and pundits gain a certain gritty dignity from humble roots.

Instead of ruining their street cred, residents' associations committee members should thank naughty teenagers for livening up the agendas of monthly meetings. Otherwise, the most exciting topic would be dog turds on the pavement (once, I sat through a two-hour borough council meeting on the subject, and found myself siding with the dogs).