Pricey celebrity clubs and a little bit of schadenfreude

Okay, I'm filing this under "reasons I'm glad I'm not really wealthy and famous"...

Schadenfreude is one of my favorite words. It's German for "the pleasure that you get from the misfortune of others." As much as we'd all like to deny it, everyone experiences a little schadenfreude from time to time. The joy is, of course, multiplied when the miserable thing happens to someone who is much richer and more famous than you are or will ever be. Schadenfreude is the little bit of smug delight that you get when staring into a picture of Paris Hilton in an orange jumpsuit or Lindsay Lohan wandering, sweaty-faced and drunk, across the pages of every tabloid in the country. Lest you start to get down on yourself (or me!) for this pleasure, keep in mind that it more or less provides Lindsay and Paris with careers. Neither has done much creative work of note for the past few months (or, in the case of Paris, ever). However, there they are, taking up a huge space in the public consciousness.