No German Word for Small Talk

I only hope that German spankings themselves aren't so clumsy as the stories.

We Brits could probably do with a dose of germanic honesty! I love the hairdresser put-down, though it's probably guaranteed to result in very hurt feelings here!
As for our puzzling, and entirely redundant greeting, 'How do you do?' I once heard a European respond, "How do I do what?"

Most languages have fairly meaningless polite greetings and questions - meaningless but not pointless. "How do you do?" presumably comes from some archaic usage and means the same as "How are you?" - in other words, seeking confirmation that things are OK, but we no longer expect even a stereotyped reply. However, if I feel ill and excuse myself from a meeting, then returning a few minutes later, "How are you?" might be said as a genuine, concerned enquiry about my health. Depends on context and intonation. In German and many other languages, if A thanks B, it's expected for B to say something stereotyped along the lines of "be my guest", "no problem", "pleasure" or whatever - but in British English this is not expected (Americans do it, probably because of continental European influences). A few languages (Finnish, for instance) have almost no polite stock phrases - very direct, but leaving their speakers in danger of giving offence abroad.

What about looking up "plaudern", "schwatzen". You can waste just as much time with Germans as with English-speaking blablers.