I’m in a Subway Relationship – and It’s Complicated

You’re a weary office warrior. You’re always running late and forgot to pack your lunch. As noon approaches and you begin to not enjoy the awkward feeling of your stomach touching your thighs, there’s really only one option on the menu.

Subway.

Subway, the healthy place “where fresh is the taste” is a burden of my existence. As you can tell by my Sub Club card that I’ve only had 4 weeks.

If I hate it so much, then obviously my car just has a severe pull to the left and I end up there..and I wake up not knowing what day it is, why I’m parked in the grass, or why I’m wearing a sleeveless Twisted Sister t-shirt. No, that describes my Saturday mornings. Indeed, I am cognizant of my choice to go to Subway.

That, I cannot explain. But why I hate it, I can. Here are my top ten reasons why I loathe the birthplace of Jared.

10) If a key selling point of your product is “eat fresh” you’d think you might actually want to have an item or two that was fresh. Bagged lettuce, pre-sliced meats, rubbery pre-cooked chicken, tomatoes that apparently were bought at a garage sale in South America months ago, and frozen pizzas. In that case, my freezer at home also offers quite the fresh assortment.

9) Yes, we know you heat up things in a microwave. Could you at least hide it in the back or something?

8 ) Try ordering a BLT. Unless you ask for all 3 of those items by name, you will receive a bread sandwich. I try to solve this problem on specialty sandwiches by just asking them to make it “like in the picture.” That does not help. It seemed possible the sandwich artist was not aware of the color menu above their head.

7) Speaking of sandwich artists, there are a lot of artists that apparently are pregnant, have facial piercings, don’t quite finish their cigarette completely while walking through the door, and are from India. Why they chose a setup that requires such a significant amount of interaction with their employees, I will never know.

6) Using a Subway drive through. There are few worse decisions you can make in life. I hope you like onions and meatballs.

5) Subway can be very healthy. You’ll need about 45 minutes to read through the health guide, and will need to order an extra water to swallow the dry, vegetable stuffed flatbread you just ordered. No, you can have a slice of cheese when you get home after you go to the gym.

4) The 12″ is such a deal..but there’s no way that’s healthy. Perhaps take it home for dinner? My guess is the average bite is 3″, so either you’re going to “just take a nibble” off the other half, or you’re going to be a pretty unpleasant person to be around the rest of the day.

Which reminds me, when they cut it crooked and you only get 5″ instead of 6″, you’d think that at some point you’d get that 7″ half just by chance. Apparently some lucky guy is walking around with  7″ subs everyday because it ain’t ever me.

3) McDonald’s seems to have gotten the whole “franchise” concept down pretty good, but try using a coupon or getting a deal you saw advertised on TV at your local Subway, and you’ll be calling corporate and telling them to correct the fine print to say “at participating store only.”

2) Subway breakfast. Even I won’t eat that.

1) Oh, you’re out of whatever chip variety I would like even though you seem to have all the other ones? That’s ok, there were only 3 in the bag anyways and I don’t think the flavor was able to even register. Oh look, Cheetos.