Chess in Israel

As a general rule, I avoid playing chess during the week on Chess.com . Experience has demonstrated there is a causal relationship between hours of sleep and play performance, and during the week it's rare that I get the recommended daily allowance of eight hours' sleep per night. Where I go to satisfy my obsession instead is Lichess . I play 3- and 5-minute blitz games on the toilet at work and 10-minute rapid games later in the day when the appetite for chess demands it. This afternoon I was all alone in the school after having corrected a pile of grade seven notebooks when I felt the urge for a rapid game. The Lichess server matched me with an opponent rated 1591, and he opened with e4. I replied with e6, he brought his knight out to f3, and I played c6 hoping to avoid the dreaded Exchange Variation of the French Defense. Alas, on move 5 he initiated an exchange of pawns on the d-file and followed that up with a check from his queen on e2:

Today's game was a frustrating loss on time where I failed to identify attacking opportunities and made numerous moves purely for the sake of stopping the clock. My rating before the game was 1233, an all-time high after gaining a point the previous day from a drawn endgame against a higher-rated opponent. White opened with e4 and Bc4, and I transposed into the French from e6 and c5. The engine indicates d5 would have been a better second move, but I sometimes prefer c5 when White's second move isn't d4. As shown below, after move 7 I had three pieces developed, superior control of the center, and a king ready to castle short. My opponent, meanwhile, had only a quasi-fianchettoed bishop to show for his trouble.