I-40 Ian

Member of the #MallerMilitia

Husband, Dad, Pop-Pop, Son, Brother

American 1st, Conservative 2nd, Republican 3rd

Truck Driver

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@uhbroncofan #mallermilitia

[Dr. Clown, PhD @DrClownPhD]

Me every time I see Sydney Sweeney.

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@benmaller this is how I imagine your experience with Raisin Canes. #mallermalitia

[NOBUNAGA🇯🇵🏯_夏樹蒼依 @japan_nobunaga]

In Louisiana a friend took me to Raising Cane's.

I asked the cashier, a young woman named Kayla, for the menu.

She pointed at the board. It was short. Suspiciously short.

"Chicken fingers," she said.

I waited for the rest.

There was no rest.

I asked about beef.

"Chicken fingers."

I asked about pork.

"Still chicken fingers."

I asked whether this was a translation problem.

She said, "No, baby. We do one thing."

A short menu is not poverty.
A short menu is a vow you can taste.

I have ordered from menus with one hundred choices and felt no fear. This board knocked me down with five words.

I asked what she recommended.

"Chicken fingers."

So I did what any reasonable man would do when a path has three names.

I ordered all three.

The Box. The 3 Finger. The Caniac.

Kayla paused. "You want all three?"

"If the menu has three names," I said, "I will meet all three. A warrior does not sample honor. He answers all of it."

They arrived. They were all chicken fingers. Different counts. Same destiny. The Caniac was not a separate creature. It was simply more of the creature.

Kayla set down the sauce without ceremony.

I tasted it.

This sauce is not a side.
This sauce is the law the chicken agreed to live under.

I later learned the restaurant is named after a dog. A yellow dog. The founder wanted a place that sold only chicken fingers. Banks said no. A professor failed the plan. He opened anyway, in 1996, near a college gate in Baton Rouge.

Thirty years.

Same board.

Same five things.

I came back the next day. Kayla saw me and spoke first.

"Chicken fingers?"

I bowed. I ordered The Box. I did not ask for the rest of the menu. There is no rest of the menu. There never was.

They told him one idea was too small for America.

He kept the one idea anyway.

And America did not walk past it.
America did not ask for a second idea.
America formed a line, handed over its money, and knelt to chicken fingers like a nation recognizing its own king.

I finished every finger in that box.
I licked the salt from my thumb like a man sealing a treaty.
I looked at that short board the way my grandfather looked at a sword that had never failed him.

Raise the banner for the dog.
Raise the banner for the man who refused to add a second thought.
Raise the banner for the shortest menu in the empire.

I am not visiting anymore.

I am reporting for duty.

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@klara_sjo I hear that's near Platner campaign headquarters

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@TheBabylonBee @mirandadevine This made me think of dear old Norm. "This just in. Murder now legal in California."

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@ThomasSowell NDT proving his PhD was DEI

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@olscurfybastard You're right. I will not pass on Bananarama from the '80s. Lol.

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@olscurfybastard That's really cool. And, yes. Unless you happen to have been In the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, the Who, or Black Sabbath.

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@PaulCharchian @czabe Fun fact. Neil Peart didn't play the album version. It was their original drummer. John Rutsey. The Pete Best of Canada.

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@czabe @PaulCharchian

I'm going to do the very annoying, "How could you not..." But, how could either one of you not have Working Man as a must need to see Rush perform live? Great episode, though. And, yeah, she's a smoke show. Good job steering the ship, Charch.

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@PaulCharchian @czabe The reggae style? Hell yeah

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@olscurfybastard For sure. Been gone for 40 years, though. Albuquerque now. But it is still really cool to know that People not too far from where I came from play such an integral part in the Revolution.

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@olscurfybastard Grew up not too far from Setauket on Long Island.

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@olscurfybastard Not to mention Anna Strong (Heather Lind) is a smoke show.

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@damage1st2rise Hank Greenberg or Ted Williams

[Digital Space Monkey @olscurfybastard]

The Hantavirus crowd is almost as funny as Flat Earthers. What's better is that they're also the people claiming to be "Pro-Science." Whatever. We all need a good laugh...

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@BeatlemaniaUK Doesn't specify if the songs that were written by one of them: So, penned by one of them: All Things Must Pass/Child of Nature (Jealous Guy/The Castle of the King of the Birds/Everybody's Got Soul/ Too Bad About Sorrow/Watching Rainbows/Gimme Some Truth/The Back Seat of My Car.

[I-40 Ian @truckerIan1]

@libsoftiktok Kind of like Palestinians are taught to hate the Jews from a young age.

[Spicoli in Chapel Hill 🇺🇸 USA @spicoli_75]

The Obama Presidential Library will require a PHOTO ID to prove RESIDENCY for free admission on Tuesdays.

Barack Obama is limiting admission to certain races apparently.

[Giga Based Dad @GigaBasedDad]

Accurate.