I must admit that on tumbling out of bed at 3 am on a Dragonfly back in the 70s to go and take a couple of F4s from Leuchars up to intercept a Bear north of The Shetlands I used to feel the same. We knew they were there, they knew we knew they were there, they never violated our airspace, so it all seemed a bit of a waste of time. But our seniors and betters thought that we should be seen to react, so ours wasn't to reason why, ours was to do and fly!
Still, got some nice piccies for the logbook out of it, I suppose!