Hi everyone!
My name is Martin, I am 31 from Slovakia and this is my first attempt to start a poker blog so please have patience with the content and my English grammar 
First - something about how I got into poker...
It all started about 3 years ago in a pub We used to go there to drink some beer, play chess and have a good time... Then one day a friend of mine persuaded me to join a pub pokergame. It was 7 or 8 player sngo of NL Holdem with buy-in of about 5$. I was drunk enough to say OK and my friend quickly explained me the rules... Not surprisingly I was out of the first one in like 3 or 4 hands so I just drank more beer and watched the others play... The second sngo was no better - I was the first one out again - but improved to last for like 8 hands maybe In the 3rd one I was proud not to bust out first, but no money still... I dont know If I was lucky or the others got drunk more than me, but eventually I finished 2nd (and cashed!!! ) in the next one and won the last one! Oh - and I still remember check calling my flopped nut straight all the way till all the chips went in in the heads up That was when I got that feeling that maybe poker was a game of skill and that maybe I should give it a try...
In a couple of days a registered at AbsolutePoker but because I didnt trust all that online poker stuff i decided not to deposit any money and spent one long summer playing freerolls...
In two months time playing maybe for 3-4 hours a day and some 0.05$ - 0.20$ cashes I had my first bankroll of about 5$ (of course I didnt have any idea what BR management was) and I decided to risk 1/5 of it in a 1$ MTT... Maybe the pokergods felt sorry for a guy like me or something but I managed to win it and suddenly my BR was well over 100$.
I started playing 1$-5$ sngoes and did really well and in like 3 weeks I ran it up to about 700$. I clearly remember I felt like I must have been one of the best players in the world Of course that was a huge mistake 
Suddenly I was a 20$ "regular" and went busto in 2 weeks experiencing my first downswing and megadonkeytilt...
Now I was sure that online poker was one big hoax and I decided to never play again...
It took maybe six months and some TV poker commercials to bring me back...
I registered at ParadisePoker and after maybe 2 months of freerolling, building my BR to 10$ and then losing it all in 5 minutes in a cash game, I decided to deposit my own money - and because it was my own money I decided to take the game more seriously... In my freerolling era - I managed to finaltable and even win some 2000+ players MTTs so I thought that definitely that would be my game...
I deposited about 40$, started to read some articles (but not many really - cause I still had the feeling I understood the game) and went busto in like a month. I thought - OK - 40$ is not that much for a month (Usually 2 evenings out drinking at that time), so I deposited another 40$... Busto again but I held for 6 weeks maybe... So I decided to give it one last try not because of the money, but because losing felt so stupid...
In a couple of weeks I had my last 5$ in my bankroll and promised myself to never deposit again...
Maybe it were the pokergods feeling sorry for the fish or just a sick run but in no time I had more than 100$...
And that was when in my opinion I made one of the fundamental things a beginning player should do and its the reason why I feel grateful to every online poker blogger and want to give something back blogging and maybe inspiring and helping myself...
So the fundamental thing - after seeing people recommending it at many poker forums I decided to read my first poker book... And it was the bible of poker (IMO) "The theory of poker" by Mr. David Sklansky. I can still remember very clearly how I felt after reading only like 3-5 pages... I said to myself: "Oh maaan, everything you thought you knew about poker is worth almost nothing, and this book is pure gold page by page..."
As an active chess player I suddenly found a lot of similarities between poker and chess - maybe the most important ones (IMO) are:
1. Its very easy to learn the rules of both games but it takes lifetime of constant study
to master the game...
2. Dont try to figure out the game on your own no matter how intelligent or talented you think you are if there is opportunity to gain knowledge from books written by masterminds of the game...
I can say that book changed my attitude to poker completely and the best thing was - it turned the fish I was into a winning player
There is much more I would like to share, but I think this might be enough for my first post, I hope it wasnt very tiring, and since this is my first blog and its for you guys - tell me what would you like me to post...
