I really do love where I live, but the Boston area suffers from a deli ineptitude and I want to see if it's a national thing or if I'm just unlucky.
I originally hail from Philadelphia. Say what you will about Philly, and believe me I do, but they know their way around a sandwich in that city.
And, in that area, whether it's on a prepared sandwich or it comes from your local market (Wa-Wa I love you), deli meats and cheeses come thin-sliced. You don't have to ask for thin-sliced down there because there's no other way to get it. Why? Because any Philadelphian will tell you that the flavor improves as the surface area to mass ratio increases. Though they'll phrase it as "Because it tastes better, you dope."
In Boston they aren't so bad with the meats, but there seems to regional mania for slab cheese. Perhaps that's why the call them grinders instead of subs, since you've got to grind through a foundation of cheese that melds with none of the rest of the sandwich because it's cut as thick as floor tiling.
Even worse is when you go to the market and actually ask for thin-sliced cheese. They'll slice it and ask you if the cut's all right. Invariably they've cut it extra thick. When I insist that, no, that's not even sort of thin, I get this, "Well, that's just crazy" look from the counter person. Well, I'm not crazy. I'm just from Philadelphia and I know something about sandwiches.
I don't remember it being this bad when I lived in Virginia. They didn't do made-to-order sandwiches all that well (Subway was the best you were going to get), but they didn't cut thick as a bed sheet at the supermarket.
Anyway, I need to know, is this just a New England thing? Because if it is, I might have to buy my own slicer.