I'm not talking to you

I often joke that I only have a set number of words available on any given day, my Daily Word Allocation.  Well, half-joke.  I'm not a big talker, so if I have a long conversation with someone then that's it, DWA used up.  No more talking again til the next day.

Remember this next time a conversation held with me late in the afternoon ends abruptly.

This is why I've never been a big fan of Subway.  The food is ok I guess, it's the number of words required to order that I can't cope with.  What sub would you like?  What kind of bread?  Did you want that toasted or not?  What cheese?  What salads?  What extras?  What sauce?  What drink?  Would you like a cookie?  Do you have a Subcard?

Arrrghhh!

Compare this to, say, McDonald's.  What would you like?  Big Mac combo.  Coke ok with that?  Yup.  Four words and I'm fed.

Even better are those quaint little self-serve coffee shops.  You know the ones, with plastic cabinets that have flip-up fronts on them that make it impossible to keep the front open AND get the tongs in AND hold the paper bag open AND get your custard square into it without scraping all the icing off around the edge of the bag.

At least with these there can actually be no talking on my part whatsoever.  I take my food up to the counter, I hold the bag open obligingly, they tell me how much, I wave my EFTPOS card in the air to indicate method of payment, I swipe, I enter my PIN, I smile, I leave.

But, technology is now threatening my custom at the quaint little self-serve coffee shop.

Subway has online ordering.

And it's a double bonus.  Not only can I just click checkboxes and choose from drop-down menus without uttering a single syllable, but I can also do so at my leisure.

I can now mull over which bread I'd like without having to remember the seventeen options the pimply-faced little oik just rattled off impatiently.

I can google the difference between Swiss and English cheese and make an informed decision rather than picking the last one Pimply-Face said cos that's the only one I can remember and I can't bear to ask him to repeat them.

I can ruminate over the pros and cons of the 23 available sauces without caving to the pressure and just picking one at random.

You could argue that I still have to use one word, my name, when I go to pick up my order. Originally, this was true. But not any more.

I've picked up so often from the Willis Street Subway that they know me now. I just have to turn up, wave my EFTPOS card, swipe, enter my PIN, smile, and leave.

And my DWA remains untouched.