A Hooker Named Tela

If you are not a frequent reader of Coventry, let me give you some quick background on what I do for a living. I'm a freelance writer specializing in poker, Las Vegas, and gambling. I follow the poker tournament circuit all over the world and spend way too much time in Las Vegas.

My Phishy and poker worlds collided last week when I met a hooker shortly after the conclusion of the World Series of Poker. And she told me that her name was Tela. You can read about our encounter in a piece entitled... Existentialist Conversations with Hookers: Maelstrom at the Hooker Bar.

Here's a bit:

"What's your name?" I asked.

"Tela," she said.

Wow, that's was a peculiar coincidence. Tela was the name of a Phish song and she had never heard of that band before. No shocker there. The only other Tela that I came across was a cat. My ex-girlfriend had a Siamese cat named Tela. (Later that morning, I'd send my ex-girlfriend a text that said, "u named your cat after a vegas hooker." She's a third grade teacher at a parochial school in Dallas and was not exactly thrilled when she received my drunken text.)

I steered the conversation towards economics. I wanted to know how the credit crunch and the collapse of the hyper-risky subprime-mortgage market affected the average Las Vegas working girl.

"It sucks," she said. "Business is bad. No one has money. Shit, I might have to actually get a real job."

.... More