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I think Otis Redding says it best. Faaa fa-fa fa fa fa-fa faa fa. What does it mean...? Who cares, I mean it's a sad song, but it's a lovely song. It's like listening to someone with a great accent. You don't really care about what they're saying. They could be talking about their ailing grandmother and you'd still be smiling. I was watching a commercial on tv recently when some pennsylvania friends were out for a visit. It was about a vacuum. It was captivating. Do I care about vacuum technology, do I even remember which vacuum was advertised? Pretty much no, but Shannon and I were still drooling over it. Was the guy particularly good-looking? No, no you would be missing the point here. He was...British I think. Which means that whatever he says is absolutely fascinating.

Now Matt picked up on this right away and was giving us a bad time. He said it's so annoying how girls will swoon over an Australian accent, New Zealand, English, Irish, Scottish... I admit, it's completely shallow, but... ahem... it's not just girls, I reminded him. Which he conceded. So why is that? What is so lovely about some accents, and let's face it, repulsive about others. Not all accents are appealing. The Brooklyn doesn't do it for me. But Scottish, you can't even understand sometimes... which is just perfect.

I think it must be the combination of familiar language and the strangeness of its sound. It demands your attention, to really catch it and somehow you just get caught up in catching it all. Maybe that's part of why we like lyrics and poetry. It's not the mundane language we're used to hearing and saying all day. It makes you think about what's being said, but mostly it's supposed to sound pleasant. There's a rhythm to it, which is hard to resist.