I'm very close to being able to come up for air now... I think! I'm hoping I'm about to enjoy my decent night's sleep in over a week. I've even been allowed to introduce a bit of recreational web browsing into tonight's schedule, and was lead to the following website/video. Those of you with musical inclinations already know that the Shire theme is based around a five-note, or pentatonic scale. Bobby McFerrin's experiment below would seem to suggest that our brains are either hardwired or sociologically conditioned to be attracted to such scales.
Interesting stuff, this! And if you find it flying over your head a bit, don't worry, the book will help explain things. There I got my plug in as well!

Back soon, I promise. The stressful legalities of the past few days will, I sincerely hope, soon be a thing of the past. I, for one, am very ready to put this time behind me, and to refocus on more musical concerns!