Corporate Comfort

There are so so so many independently owned places to get a meal in the neighborhood of my office. And they are great! In fact, many of them are not even open on Saturdays and Sundays simply because they cater only to the office lunch crowd in Tribeca/the Financial District. It's really fabulous to have so many choices and one of the big reasons I really like New York is because you'd be hard pressed to get tired of eating out around here. There's just too much to try! The only unfortunate thing is that 8 dollars is thew new 5 dollars. Le sigh! But, back to the good... I love how in New York you can get anything made just the way that you want it. People can be incredibly meticulous to the point of OCD status and you'd think this would drive restaurant workers insane ("Yeeeah, can I getta smoked turkey, little mayo, lettuce, on toasted roll, mustard on the side?"), but, to the contrary, they'll make anything you want and usually with little guff given. It's like just the way things are here; order it the way you want it, I'll make that for you, sure, move on. Next. No pleases, not a lot of thank yous. Just a straight up relationship between you and your sandwicheer. It's actually sort of refreshing, in the way that I remember the no-bullshit attitude of the French being.

Here's my question of the day, however: Why, when there are a wealth of good, very good and great independent restaurants, do people feel inclined to eat corporate??? Why is there always a line at Subway and Dunkin' Donuts? And McDonald's? The fact of the matter is that it's actually often times much easier to go to an independent place and just as affordable (if not cheaper), so let's eliminate the cost and convenience aspects as reasons. Where does that leave us? Comfort. Familiarity. No thinking required. These are the reasons that I think people eat that fucking shit. It's a matter of feeling like, no matter where you are, you can have the same boring old taste in your mouth as you've had since you got your first stupid Subway BMT or whatever when you were 10 years old. So, people are just anti-change, anti-decision-making, anti-flava. What can I say?