Things we learned in Frankfurt-am-Main

It's the economy -- Gas is about $8 per gallon, but a half-liter of the world's best beer is just $4.25.

A Burberry handbag on the Goethestrasse will set you back about $3,555 (that's 2,250 Euros at 1.58 to the dollar), but you can take a train trip to Mainz and back for about eight bucks.

Nine Lives lunch -- The next time we see "homemade wurst platter" on a menu, I know a few brass players who will probably run the other way. They found out the hard way that that does not mean little sausages, but big, hocky-puck-size hunks of blutwurst (blood sausage), kopfkase (head cheese) and liverwurst on a big plate with pickles (pictured above). They ordered four of them...