From The Request Line: My Unhappy Days As A Sandwich Customizer

For a brief time, early in my days as a desperate man, I had a job at this ubiquitous sandwich chain. It was outrageous. It was awful beyond belief.

I worked for this flinching woman who sat in the back room all day “portioning,” which basically involved sorting meat. You’ve probably seen how this works: they put slices of lunch meat in various combinations between little squares of wax paper.

Everything in these places is placed on a scale to make sure everybody gets exactly the same amount of everything, which isn’t much. When they train you they actually stand there and weigh your sandwiches and say things like, “This sandwich looks a little lettuce-heavy,” or, “only use enough olives so that the customer can actually feel like he’s getting olives on his sandwich. Never use more than two fingers, that’s the best rule for customizing.”

Jesus, that was a terrible job, and I had to wear a uniform.

The worst part of it, though, was the way the customers stood there staring at your hands while you built their stupid sandwiches, watching your every move. It was like you were trying to pull something over on them. I swear, humans are worse than dogs. I would love to have a videotape of people watching their sandwiches being prepared, standing there completely slack-jawed.

If the average person had to see themselves the way I saw them across the sneeze guard everyday, I’m not shitting you, they’d fall over dead from embarrassment.