Lend me some sugar, I am your neighbor

Last night I was cooking dinner and listening to a Nick Cave CD I got in Germany. I don’t buy physical CDs anymore, which is maybe sad, but nevertheless true. I buy them online or get copies made by friends. For my birthday, Amanda sent me an ITunes playlist she had created, which was very cool and a fun way to share music. It included a slow, beautiful cover of Outkast’s Hey Ya by Obadiah Parker that I absolutely love. As an aside (to what might already be an aside), when I was in Thailand 4 years ago and met a group of small kids who spoke no English, my friend Krista and I entertained them by singing Hey Ya, after we ran through our brief repertoire of nursery rhymes.

But back to Nick Cave. I was in Germany. More specifically, I was at the Frankfurter Hof, a bar that publishing people all go to during the Frankfurt Book Fair, resulting in the regrettable fact that we have all traveled intercontinentally to hang out with each other. Acknowledging the pitiful nature of this situation did not stop me from going to the Hof on 2 of the 4 nights that I was in Frankfurt.

Bellying up to the bar, I asked for glasses of champagne for myself and 2 colleagues. I know what you’re thinking. Really? At your exotic American-filled bar in Germany, you thought champagne would be the appropriate choice of beverage? To which I reply, there was one bar that served champagne only, and I didn’t realize it until I reached the front of the line. I peered across the large hall to the other bar that served beer and thought, screw that. Also, there were totally British people there. Now stop asking questions.

As I gave the bartender my order, a bouncy-haired sprite (aka a publisher I have never met before) came out of nowhere and asked me if I could order 2 more glasses of champagne. He wanted, he informed me, to present one to an author of his who had just won a major award. He would give me cash for the champagne.

So I changed my order to 5 glasses of champagne, for the bargain price of 75 Euro. And that cash that he was going to give me? Yeah. He handed me a Nick Cave CD and said conspiratorially, “Only 200 of these were made. Enjoy.”

I am enjoying it. But I’m not sure it was worth 30 Euro.