I've never thought of it as an optimization problem at all, until now, but I do a form of this all the time when I'm listening to a playlist with a wide variety

I've never thought of it as an optimization problem at all, until now, but I do a form of this all the time when I'm listening to a playlist with a wide variety and nothing better going on (For instance when running or driving.) The thing is for something trivial like that, it doesn't actually matter if you remember the satisfaction or not, all that really matters is if you are more satisfied than you think you were with the previous song, accuracy be damned.