So who here has ever eaten at Subway?  Everyone?  Good.  Now who here has ever ordered a Footlong™ sub from Subway?  Well, almost everyone.  You in the back?  Oh, you don’t even speak English.  No wonder you didn’t raise your hand.  Get outta here.

So I’m guessing most of you have heard by now that Footlong™ sandwiches at Subway aren’t actually a foot long.  “What?!?!” you surely just yelled as you spat out a mouth full of coffee all over your laptop, iPad, or LCD monitor.  “Footlong means foot long, right?  12 inches!  That’s a foot!  What the fuck?” you’re most certainly rambling through your clenched, coffee-covered jaw.

All of this just came to light recently.  Per this article in the Huffington Post, a teenager in Australia bought an alleged footlong sandwich only to find out it was 11 inches long.  The dude measured it with a tape measure he happened to have with him.  Why he had a tape measure in Subway has yet to be ascertained.

Let’s travel over to dictionary.com and see what they say the word footlong actually means.  Well, well.  They say, and I quote, “something that is approximately one foot in length.”   Notice the word approximately in the definition.  It doesn’t say that it means that something is exactly a foot long, but is approximately one foot long.  So now whether you’re getting hosed or not by Subway is a matter of opinion.  Is 11 inches approximately one foot long?  It’s all subjective now.  Oh how I love gray areas.  Why can’t everything be black and white, dammit!!

Adding fuel to the publicity conflagration was Subway’s idiotic response to the backlash of their non-footlong footlongs.  In a released statement they had this to say:

With regards to the size of the bread and calling it a footlong, ‘SUBWAY FOOTLONG’ is a registered trademark as a descriptive name for the sub sold in Subway® Restaurants and not intended to be a measurement of length. The length of the bread baked in the restaurant cannot be assured each time as the proofing process may vary slightly each time in the restaurant.

A registered trademark of a descriptive name?  The descriptive name, by definition, means footlong.  Foot.  Long.  As in 12 inches.  Do they really expect the general public to accept this asinine explanation?  I mean, really.  The general public is pretty stupid, but I seriously doubt they’re that stupid.  The last part of their statement is true, at least.  It’d be extremely tough to get each loaf of bread to exactly 12 inches.  But it shouldn’t be more than a quarter-inch off, in my humble estimation.

Per the linked article, the New York Times bought 7 Subway Footlong sandwiches as a test and 4 of the 7 were 11 1/2 inches or shorter.  Talk about getting hosed.  The problem with this is it’s not only the footlongs that you’re getting shortchanged on.  If the entire loaf of bread is only 11 inches and you order a 6-inch sub, you’re really only getting a 5 1/2-inch sub once they cut that 11-inch loaf of bread in half.  Surely Subway doesn’t have PR people dumb enough to say that a 6-inch sub is only a description and not meant to be a measurement of length, because that would be almost as dumb as saying a footlong isn’t a measurement of length.  Oh, wait…

In desperate search of logical answers, I sought out a representative for Subway.  Most of them are famous athletes, so I had to settle for Jared Fogle.  Yeah, that annoying douche who holds up a denim comforter in every commercial claiming that it used to be a pair of his pants from when he was a fat ass.

I convinced Jared to sit down for an interview with me.  In this hard-hitting interview, I asked the tough questions that most Subway  executives won’t honestly answer.

TD:  Jared, thank you for agreeing to this interview.  It really means a lot to me.

Jared:  Like I had a choice.  You threatened to stun me repeatedly with your blaster if I didn’t.

TD:  Shut the fuck up!  You want me to get hostile I’ll get hostile!  Quit whining and start answering questions, bitch.

Jared: Uh…okay.

TD:  What do you know of the cover-up in the Great Subway Footlong scandal?

Jared:  Scandal?  I just go on TV and tell people that Subway is healthy alternative to fast-food restaurants and you can lose weight like me with smart dietary choices and daily exercise.

TD:  Yeah, great.  When were you made aware of the 11-inch sub phenomenon?

Jared:  I saw it on the news like everybody else.

TD:  And do you have an explanation for your fan?

Jared: Don’t you mean fans?

TD: No.

Jared:  Oh.  Well…  As the statement Subway released says…

TD: That statement is total bullshit and we all know it.

Jared:  Look, they just pay me to talk.  I’m a spokesman.  I don’t know anything else.

TD:  Riiiiiight.  We’ll move on then.  You’ll be sorry when I can properly interrogate your ass later.

Jared: *gulps*

TD:  So, you lost 245lbs on the so-called “Subway Diet,” correct?

Jared: That’s right.

TD: How much of that do you attribute to getting 5 1/2-inch subs rather than the full 6-inch subs?

Jared:  Ummm….

TD: I thought as much.  Is that how the diet works?  They trick you into thinking you’re eating more than you actually are?  Does that somehow make your stomach feel full even though you’re not eating as much as you think you’re eating?  A psychological decoy?

Jared:  I have to pee.

TD: Silence!

Jared:  …….

TD:  Good.  That’ll be all for now, but know this:  I shall find your secrets.  No matter how painful it is for you.

So as you can plainly see, the smaller sandwiches were all part of the marketing ploy for the “Subway Diet,” which if you ask me is a total con.  I implore you all to henceforth take your rulers with you to Subway when you dine in those “fine” establishments.  If you don’t get an actual footlong or 6-inch sub, take justice into your own hands.  Or, if you prefer, call Miraculous Man.  He’s certainly not opposed to dispensing justice when no one else will do so.