WALTON- The cook's in the kitchen pouring au jus into a crock pot, but the real flavor of Glenn's Woodland Inn is the man in khaki pants and a blue button-down shirt.
Glenn ''Bulldog'' Wright, 64, fills his shirt as if he's partaken often of tonight's special, the thin-sliced prime rib over sourdough. His presence fills the restaurant.
They serve country ham and catfish at Glenn's, but you need only walk in the door to get a taste of Kentucky. The roadside restaurant, hard by U.S. 25, squats amid farmland near a string of forgotten motels in the middle of nowhere. It draws folks from miles around, though.
''There's people been here from all over the country,'' Bulldog says in that deep, mumbly drawl. He talks like a man with a mouthful of green beans.
Glenn Wright sounds the way a bulldog might if bulldogs could speak. He looks like a bulldog, too, with eyes dark and bright like steel. But these things aren't what got folks calling him Bulldog; it's what happened years ago, when he was a boy growing up in Owen County, where his father worked as a tenant farmer.
When Glenn was 5, he picked up a rock and found a snake hiding underneath. He squalled. The man who owned the farm put the snake around Glenn's neck. Glenn started throwing rocks and dirt clods at the man. When the regulars down at the old country grocery got wind of it, they started calling the boy Bulldog.
Fifty-nine years later, the name sticks. The restaurant is full of bulldog figurines. Most are ceramic. One is cast iron. Another is made of concrete.
''Just people bring 'em in,'' Bulldog says. ''They know m'name's Bulldog.''
On a sign above the salad bar is a picture of a bulldog.
''Food costs a lot of money,'' the sign says. ''Please take what you want. But please eat what you take, or you will have to pay extra.''
If that sounds like something your mother would say, consider the location. Glenn's is a family-run restaurant, and eating there is a little like going home for a meal. Photos of children and grandchildren hang over the hot plates.
''Take home a bag of homemade croutons,'' another sign says.
Saturday, Glenn and Yvonne Wright's son Steve brought his basketball team in for a pre-game dinner of chicken breasts and green beans. Steve is the coach at South Laurel High School, which played Ryle High School Saturday night.
''They love coming here,'' Yvonne says as she fills up the salad bar with ice.
They're not alone. Lots of folks love coming to Glenn's.
But all over the country?
''All over,'' Glenn says. ''They come from Grant County, Owen County, ever'where. Indiana. Cincinnati.
A band plays dinner music here on the weekends. Once, Mickey Gilley stopped in for a quick, impromptu session after a performance in Cincinnati.
''All the girls are pretty at closing time,'' he sang.
But this isn't a roadhouse anymore, the way it was before Bulldog bought it in 1975. Once upon a time it was a rough place. Now it's a restaurant you can take the whole family to. Ceiling fans spin lazily over the tables.
There's nothing lazy about Bulldog, though. He works up to 120 hours a week. Sometimes he does the cooking. Bulldog can't find enough help these days. The labor pool isn't that big in Walton.
''To run a business,'' Bulldog says, ''you know what my philosophy is?
''If you see a train going down the track, it's got an engine on the front. If it's going down the track without an engine, it's going downhill.''
He jingles the change in his pocket.
''I'm the engine here.''
Rob Kaiser is The Enquirer's Kentucky columnist. His column appears on Sundays and Thursdays in The Kentucky Enquirer. He can be reached at 578-5584.