Once again, the Ribeye is involved in drama at work.

Last week, during a conversation with a couple of other employees, we got onto the topic of underage drinkers.  A certain co-worker, we’ll rename him Igganunt for todays purposes even though he’s been mentioned here before by another name,  and his girlfriend had been coming in during our now extinct employee bowling night, and drank a bit.

I had seen the girlfriends MySpace page, what little is visible when an account is set to private, and I remembered seeing her age listed as “18″.  As to it being accurate, I’ll never know, but I mentioned to the people I was talking to that I saw the age of “18″ on the page.  I made it quite clear that it was on MySpace, and that I didn’t know but I wouldn’t take the chance of serving her alcohol…not that I’d serve Igganunt or his girlfriend anyway, she’s one of those that weirds me out.

One of the employees that was involved with the conversation worked again the next day, which was this past Thursday (4/24).   Igganunt, whose girlfriend we’d discussed the day before, was also working.  The employee from the day before (Employee X to avoid confusion) asked Igganunt how old his girlfriend was.  He told Employee X that his girlfriend was 23.

Employee X then tells Igganunt that I, the Ribeye of your Dreams, was telling people his girlfriend was 17 and that we were getting her drunk.

What was actually said by the Ribeye, many times during the course of the conversation the day before was “I saw it on MySpace, I don’t know if it’s true or not”.

Igganunt gets pissed off.  Igganunt decides to revert back to the age of 14, impressive for a 26 year old that’s in school.  Igganunt begins going to every other employee working on Thursday and telling them something interesting about me that I didn’t even know.

I walked into work Friday night (4/25), and I see Employee X.  Employee X walks up to me and says, “So I hear you have Herpes.”

Wow.  That’s news to me, especially since I haven’t recently been to a doctor, had sex, or even a cold sore.  “Excuse me?”

“Yeah, Igganunt’s been running around telling everyone that you’ve got Herpes because you said his girlfriend was 17 and we was letting her drink.”

“I never said that his girlfriend was 17.  I said the age I saw on her MySpace profile was “18″ and that I didn’t know for sure.  I also said to pay close attention to the ID just in case.”

“Nuh uh, you told me she was 17.”  It later came out that after Employee X asked the age and found it out, Employee X was the one to inform Igganunt of this false information, and that I was running around telling everyone this false information.  There were only 4 people total involved in the original conversation, and the age of 17 was never mentioned.

“No, that’s not what I said.”

“I coulda swore that’s what you told us.”  That’s how I found out it was Employee X who gave Igganunt the false information.

Now I find out that all through the building, even though it’s not believed by anyone but our English challenged workers, people have been told that I have Herpes.  Something that I myself didn’t even know.

I now find that I have a few options.  I’m not pissed off about the rumor itself because quite frankly, Igganunt and I don’t like each other and it doesn’t surprise me in the least that he’d start one like that.  This is the same server who refuses to do sidework, who doesn’t polish silverware and rarely rolls it, and as of a few weeks ago forges the signatures of the closing servers, the bartenders he’s supposed to tip out before he leaves, and the manager.  This is the same server who cuts himself off the floor whenever he pleases, and refuses to pick up tables because he just “doesn’t want to”.

I have dirt on this server that I could use.  I’ve got access to a couple of pieces of media that I know he doesn’t want publicized at work.  I have the rumor skills to make his life a living Hell at work.  I also have grounds to get him terminated based on the number of people he bluntly and falsely informed that I have Herpes.  Slander is a bitch when you have people willing to write statements.

I must admit that I’ve been having fun with the rumor thus far, and none of the above ideas appeal to me save for the last one.  I’m not a child, I’m 27 years old and haven’t been in school for 9 years now.  I don’t plan to start any rumors about him, anything that I say about him is the truth and everyone knows it.  It’s why there’s not many people that actually respect him, that and his utter disdain for doing his job.

The fun I’ve been having so far:  Thinking up a few replies when people ask about it such as “Well, he’d have never known about it had he not been giving me oral pleasure” and other variations of that.

Joking with my friends about it: “I’m sorry, I can’t pick up that table for you, my Herpes is acting up.  I feel all crusty.”  “I haven’t gotten my Valtrex this month and I’m oozing everywhere, I just need to go home and rest.”  “I have stress and exhaustion…it’s because of my Herpes.”

The best fun I’ve had so far though is laughing with the actual adults that I work with that someone who is over a quarter of a century old now is about as creative as a flea, and is showing his true inner child in starting a rumor that someone has an STD (not to be confused with THE STD).

My question to you, my friendly and even my not so friendly readers, is this:  What would you do in my place?  Would you take the route of revenge rumor?  Would you take the route of the witty joker, as I have thus far?  Or would you take it to the next level, and pull out the restrictions on slander from the corporate handbook, demanding that he be terminated?  I’ve gotten someone fired before, for calling me a faggot in front of witnesses.  Remember the story of Ms. K.….

I also have been wondering if Igganunt is just doing this to try and provoke me into causing a scene at work, a physical scene that would get me fired.  Sorry, Igganunt, but I’m not that stupid.

At the moment, I think I’m going to continue having fun with the rumor, at least for a couple more days until it blows over.  After that, I’m sure he’ll do something else work related that will piss me off, and I’ll then pull out the Slander card.

Note: I probably would have already gone to my GM about this had it actually bothered me, but everyone already knows it’s just a rumor, and everyone knows who started it.  I’ve been with the company over a year and a half to his 6-7 months, and I actually do what I’m supposed to do at work.  We all know who the better person is professionally, and we can obviously see who has the bigger mental capacity despite my immaturity in joking about it (hey, I can’t just let it go completely).

What would you all do?

No tag for this post yet.