I hope you all had a wonderful Easter weekend. Whether or not you believe in the divinity of Nazareth’s most famous failed carpenter, there’s nothing like a holiday. For other people, that is. While everyone else was outside enjoying the sunshine I remained chained to my laptop, rearranging this jumble of letters until they coalesced into a streamlined summary of last week’s worldwide poker news.

Jobs Posted at Full Tilt Poker

Brace yourselves, everyone. Full Tilt Poker is poised to re-emerge from the ashes like a suspiciously French-looking phoenix. Parent company Pocket Kings are advertising for a handful of new jobs, suggesting that the tarnished online poker site is preparing for a re-launch. At the very least, they must have acquired the money to pay these new employees. Here’s hoping that their budget stretches to refunding jilted players. [Bill Rini]

Isildur Defeats His Nemesis for $1 million

Ever since Viktor Blom began taking on all comers in his SuperStar Showdowns, no one has put up more stubborn resistance than Isaac Haxton. The American had won both of their previous heads-up encounters, so for their third battle the duo decided to add a little extra spice. Both would buy in for $500,000 and nobody would be allowed to leave until one player held all the money. After three days and over 5,000 hands, it was the maniacal Swede who took home the prize. [Poker News]

Russian Gambler Turns to Politics

This is quite a peculiar one, made all the stranger by the language barrier. Online poker player Max Katz has been elected to a position on the municipal council of his hometown. He reportedly funded his campaign with money made from online poker. Katz has yet to record any major live scores and seems to be known as much for staking as for any online prowess. There’s also the small matter of him allegedly providing “ghosting” services to fellow players that spawned one of the many pocket controversies on 2+2. [Telegraph]

Poker Nordica is No More

Poker sites come and go, but it’s never a happy occurrence. The latest to bow out is Poker Nordica, a solid member of the Merge network. Players began receiving messages on March 30th announcing the imminent closure of the site and, in the wake of Full Tilt, will have be worried about getting their money back. Nordica are paying out only in cheques, which means that withdrawals under $100 cannot be processed. You can, however, move your money to one of the many other Merge Network sites. Any cash left floating around in Nordica’s coffers after May 1st will be lost forever [Poker News Daily]

Successful Start for iSeriesLIVE

After a well-hyped build up, the iSeriesLIVE finally made its debut on Thursday night. For the uninformed, it was a live-streamed single table tournament with visible hole-cards, which allowed players to bet on the action as it played out. I watched the whole show and thought it went down pretty well. It’s impossible to say exactly how profitable it was from a business perspective, but a mix of noisy old-guard and interesting new-players made for an entertaining spectator sport. The eventual victor was James Dempsey, who already has WSOP and WPT titles to his name. [Poker News]

Irish Open Pays Out to Belgium

The iSeries took place in Dublin, which just so happened to be the venue for the 2012 Irish Open. As host to one of the oldest series in the world, Ireland has a good track record of attracting the poker establishment. Also there’s lots of Guinness, which helps. The main event was won by Beligian pro Kevin Vandersmissen, who pulled the old ‘chip and a chair’ routine at the final table. [Poker News Report]

With that, I’m off to drown myself in the huge piles of chocolate which have mysteriously appeared in my apartment. A significantly heavier version of me will be back next week with another Wider World of Poker.