UPDATE: Walker may have been asked to leave Merchant before his budget repair bill was introduced

These days, it seems that even casual conversation is pulled into the gaping maw of l’affaire Walker, from whose hideous pull no topic can escape. When rumors first surfaced that Scott Walker tried to dine at stylish downtown Merchant (121 S. Pinckney St., 608-259-9799) but was booed so vociferously by the guests that restaurant management asked him to leave, The A.V. Club thought it a good bit of water cooler gossip (and also completely hilarious).

Since then, however, a more interesting situation has evolved. Merchant took so many phone calls about the blog post—both negative and positive—that it asked Naomi Houser, the blogger, to remove it. The original text:

The Merchant in Madison, WI confirms that on Friday night, Patrick Sweeney (one of the owners) politely asked Scott Walker to leave the establishment when other customers began boo-ing him. A bartender at The Merchant said that, “his presence was causing a disturbance to the other customers and management asked him to leave.”

Houser removed that text and replaced it with the following:

Come looking for an article about Scott Walker being booted from a Madison restaurant? Yes, you came to the right place, but at the request of the restaurant owner due to abusive phone calls, the article has been hidden for the time being.

And now, Merchant is unreachable. It should be open for business today, but has not yet answered its phone nor returned messages.

The story continues to evolve as both Walker supporters (“Before listening to the naysayers, keep in mind how several of them have made zero contribution to Yelp so far, and just registered to slam a business they dislike”) and their antagonists (“First of all, the amount of new reviewers who gave merchant 5 stars sketches me out”) tussle through protest ratings on Merchant’s Yelp page. And the rumor now has its own topic: “So now what to do about all of these people giving them one star ratings because they voted for Walker?”

UPDATE: Adding another layer of weirdness to the already strange saga, Houser has updated her blog to change the story. “I was wrong. Yep. The screw up was all mine. Not because it never happened, but when it happened. I had heard this all from a friend but the date was utterly wrong. All of this took place in the week before the protests even started and there are witnesses to this event.” Houser also posts the transcript of a phone call to Merchant posted by Badger Blogger containing what appear to be moments supporting her story.

Whatever—and whenever—the details of the alleged Walker-booting incident, Merchant has apparently decided not to confirm or deny it (“I’m really not at liberty to ... to discuss that. You know what? It’s, it’s ... think what you want,”) and various factions continue to embrace whichever version best suits their political aims.