Burn-in time Vs. Getting used to a sound

I kind of performed this test but with the same pair of cables. When I purchased my used HT IC's (already broken in) I knew about directionality but did not know which way the arrows were supposed to go. First time round I had then backwards. It only took about 20 seconds to figure out that something was wrong. I switched them immediatley and they sounded a lot better.

If a tree falls over in a forest and no one is there did it make a noise?

I am a music teacher-making my living by giving pipils reports on their changing sound-based on my aural memory. Changes caused by burn-in are slow but amazing. Raanan

Lak: QUESTION: Does a chicken have lips? ANSWER: No, but it has cheeks.

Both are present, but getting used to the sound is the lesser of the two. A significant part of the burn-in seems to relate to how dialectrics form, whether in cables or in capacitors. The reason why I think burn-in is the larger is this: I hear the sound of a CD differently the third (or so) time I hear it compared with the first. I could ascribe this to burn-in, but it is more likely to be getting used to the sound of the recording gear used, and perhaps also the acoustic clues become less confusing with familiarity. But in running in components there seems to be a repeated sequence of how the sound changes. First bright and thin and flat. Very slowly fleshing out, then all of a sudden going soft and soggy and lacking in dynamics. Then gradually sharpening and speeding up with resolution finally reaching its peak. I find it difficult to ascribe this sequence to just getting used to the sound.