Of Sandwiches and control

What might buying a sandwich have to do with control issues one might wonder!
A lot, especially if you pay attention.

On one end of the spectrum is Jimmy John's where you in effect, cede all control over how your sandwich turns out. About 120-130 seconds after you uncertainly utter the number of the sandwich you want, and while you were still thinking of the veggies you might request or dressing you might want to hold, to assuage your guilt, the sandwich wrapped up is in your hands. If you start getting proactive and start rattling off your preferences right after choosing the sandwich number, you might as well be talking to the wind. The friendly order taker patiently waits through, what apparently she thinks is your "yadda yadda ... blah blah ...", until you pause to catch a breath, when she yells only your number to the production crew.
It makes you wonder though, somebody must have sat down to decide how much lettuce or mayo should go or not in a sandwich. From the taste of the finished product, that somebody seems less likely to be a chef and more likely a corporate head honcho.
See now what I meant about control? For your lunch, you in effect ceded control to a corporate suit to decide its specifics. I am sure it makes you feel so much better :-)

If it bothers you though, there is the other end of the spectrum in - Subway where the preparer is an artist of a very liberal predisposition and in effect refuses to accept the certainty of anything on her canvas - your sandwich, even bread. So you make choices over every little detail - salad/sandwich/wrap, bread (6 kinds), cheese (no,yes,double out of 5 kinds), toasted or not, meat selection and quantity, veggies out of a dozen choices and finally dressing - out of yet another dozen choices.
You cannot just point to a sandwich off the board and hope to escape the decision-tree that ensues. At the end of which, you have lost all interest in food and just want to pay and escape their clutches. No guarantee of taste here either, but at least it was you in the driver's seat.

If either extreme isn't for you, there is a middle of the road at Potbelly's where you have either choice. Pick a number and let them do it all, or pick a number and customize. They achieved this nirvana by limiting your choices to a handful (again that head honcho, but at least not a micro-manager). But if this were it life would be too simple. I have been there many times, but somewhere they manage to sneak in, what seems like a pint of olive oil into the sandwich, which drips to the wrapper, smears on your fingers and seems to stay with you for at least a week.

Any better suggestions? All I want is a decent sandwich.