The beginning

This blog is about my journey into the world of chess. It is a rather long trip, although I am a total beginner (I guess it is called "novice"). The journey started more than 20 years ago - I was a teenager then. A friend talked me into going to the local chess club where he played competitively. I was interested in the game so I went along and ended up playing against a 7 or 8 year old kid. We were both clueless but not being able to beat a much younger player is embarrassing for teenagers. At some point, the kid's father came to watch, as did my friend, and of course the game ended with them playing against each other. From this experience, I decided that chess is interesting, but not "my thing".

10 years later, I discovered a beautiful hand-crafted limestone chess set on a vacation in Italy. I simply had to have it, and my interest in chess showed a (rather short lived) peak. However, once again I gave up playing - this time after two or three quick losses against a computer.

Early this year, I got interested in chess again. I don't even know why exactly. In any case it seems to keep my mind off some work-related problems that hound me lately. This time, however, I took the time to find out how to actually improve my miserable play. Fortunately, there are many good websites about chess. To my surprise, after nearly two months I am still trying to improve my play and I am more fascinated by the game than ever. Therefore, I started this blog to keep notes on my chess journey. Comments and hints on how to do things better are always welcome!