First realtime 19x19 game on KGS

With a few 19x19 games on OGS under my belt, and a rank of 26 (some of which was earned, some due to timeouts), I felt more ready for realtime 19x19 games on KGS. So when the opportunity arose, I took it. Like all beginners, I was more interested in getting a good ranking than learning to improve my play, so I sought out rated games as opposed to free games (where your rating is not affected by the result).

On KGS, when you want to play, you have the option of either offering a game yourself, or selecting an offered game. I didn't see any 'appropriate' (i.e. games offered by ranked players of ~30 which would make a win more likely) games, so I offered one of my own. It was accepted by a guy with an ~18 rank, so I expected to lose, but it would all count towards my own ranking. On KGS, you need two wins and two losses to ranked players before your own rank is considered reliable enough to be shown unqualified.

But wow, the biggest shock when coming to realtime play on KGS after a couple of months of OGS is the speed of play required. It looks like the most usual game time option selected is 30 mins each, with 5x30 seconds of byo-yomi time. In addition to the novelty of a time limit, my internet access to KGS is quite laggy, with frequently 30 seconds being taken off my time each move despite my clicking the move pretty immediately. This all conspired to make my play on my first realtime game on KGS a highly anxious one.

I'd like to blame the loss on all of the above, but you gotta be able to make better decisions under time pressure than I did in this game. From stupid cutting points being gifted to the opponent, to failure to notice ataris, I think I was lucky to be only 90 points behind black.