25
#558 – London 2008 #65 – WSOP-E – Night of the Living, Part I – Night of the Living Dolls
Wednesday night, in which they played the final table of the HORSE, was a proud night for Full Tilt, even if it didn’t have a happy ending. The first thing I noticed was the women. as we waited for the HORSE final four players to return from the dinner break (and for the PLO event to restart), the three hottest women in the Empire were former Pokerwire.com girls, all connected with Full Tilt in one or more ways.
* Heather – a professional photographer now involved in pro-player relations. for all the ridiculous requests she’s turned down at touraments, I call her “Dr. No.”
* Jennifer – a double or triple engineering major who graduated from Duke, she’s a ace Razz player, an aspiring singer, and Andy Bloch’s finance.
* Amanda – the famous Mandy B, she has been seriously kicking my ass in turbos on Full Tilt for the past seven months.
I sat next to Jennifer for awhile, who was doing double duty, watching Andy nurse a short-stack at a corner table behind us – which ended well, as he doubled up twice and completed the evening’s play in 9th place overall – while watching Howard Lederer in front of us play the final table of the HORSE.
Jen is related to Howard, I believe through his wife Suzie. She gets a kick out of calling him “Uncle Howard” and regards him with real family affection. Although it may be a distant connection on the consanguinity charts, I get it.
At one point when things were slow at the final table – probably during Razz – tournament director Jack Effel asked, “Are you really Howard’s neice?”
“Well, technically,” Jen started explaining, not wanting to attract a lot of attention or especially divert Howard to explaining the connection. “It’s complicated. My sister is his niece.”
At this point, I screwed up my face and said, “Is this one of those Kentucky families?”
Jen explained that they were distantly related but she thought of him as an uncle.
“I totally understand,” I told her and Jack Effel and the people around the final table. “I’ve been asking Howard’s dad for years to adopt me. He hasn’t said no, so I guess it’s still an open question.”
Which is true. Although I love my mother and father and brother very much, I’ve enjoyed my times these last four years with Richard Lederer, his wife Simone, and his (and ex-wife Dede’s – I know Dede less well, though I like her very much too) remarkable children.
Leave a Reply