Here's a game I recently played at 7 days per move: https://www.chess.com/game/daily/355131875
Full pgn in spoilers to save room.


I have a few comments but really want to focus on the end.
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. c3 Nf6 4. Be2 Nc6 5. d4 cxd4 6. cxd4 Nxe4 7. d5 Qa5+

I just discovered the delayed Alapin (Basman-Palatnik gambit?). This particular line is really the only way for Black to take the e4 pawn without losing the knight to Qa4+. White can gambit away 4 pawns here and still maintain an equal/slightly better position due to all the pressure that can be brought by the pieces unencumbered by pawns.

8. Nc3 Nxc3 9. bxc3 Ne5 10. Nxe5 dxe5 11. Rb1 Qxc3+ 12. Bd2 Qc7 13. Bb5+
I start to go a little wrong here. 13. Rc1, 0-0, and Qb3 would be good but this moves the advantage to Black. Or so says the computer. I don't really understand such positions yet. I do start to feel that I'm losing soon, but I really realize that I just don't know what to do which is uncomfortable.

13...Bd7 14. Qa4 b6 15. O-O g6 16. Bc6 Bxc6 17. dxc6 Bg7 18. Rfd1 O-O 19. Bb4 Rfd8 20. Rd7 Rxd7 21. cxd7 Rd8 22. Rd1 Bf8 23. g3 e6 24. Bxf8 Kxf8

For a few moves, I've felt that I was losing , but I thought I could maybe get a draw. I'm down 2 pawns but do have the pawn on d7. If Black gets the king to e7, there will then be 3 attackers on my d7 pawn and only 2 defenders -- I'm lost then for sure. So I try to find a way to keep the black king away (though he could have instead given up a pawn with 25. Qa3+ Qc5 26. Qxa7) to keep my strong point alive.

25. Qa3+ Kg7 26. Qe7 b5
Uh-oh. I see now that if I do nothing, Black will just advance the queenside pawns and I will be lost. So I need to do more than just hold the position. I try to create some threats against the black king, seeing lines that seem to help me regain my pawns but just offer a drawn position in the end.

27. Rd6 b4 28. h4 h5 29. g4
Apparently a mistake, but I see that I need to open up the black king in order to achieve this draw.

29...hxg4 30. h5 gxh5 31. Rxe6

I was planning Rxe6 for a while, seeing that something like ...Qxd7 Qf6+ ...Kg8 Rxe5 may help me draw as I'm then only down 1 pawn and I can have some pressure against the black king (so Black wouldn't be able to spend extra tempi setting things up).

31...Qxd7 32. Qg5+ Kf8 33. Qh6+ Kg8 34. Qg5+ Kf8 35. Qh6+ Kg8 36. Qg5+ Kf8 1/2-1/2
Well 31...Qc1+ leads to a draw, but 31...Qxd7 should lead to 33. Rh6! I never looked at Rh6 once because 1) I had thought of Rxe5 in many lines so wasn't thinking of bringing it to the kingside, and 2) I felt I was losing for many moves, then felt I could pull off a draw, so I just wasn't in the mindset of possibly having a win. This is the "momentum of thought" from my title that I wish to eliminate -- I was so focused on finding a draw for so many moves that I couldn't even think of having a winning line.

I'm not sure if I'm looking for advice or commiseration. But I can't believe I missed 33. Rh6 twice. If I had misevaluated the position before and thought I was doing well, I bet I would have found it.

I took a quick look through the game.

There's a need to be open to "out of nowhere" type ideas; the concept that "if this was a puzzle, I would have solved it", but there's no flashing "White to move and win" when you're playing a game. That's a difficult nut to crack and the fun and challenge of OTB chess.

In my experience, when you get to a decent level, you start getting a spider sense for when there might be a resource; there's certain red flags that start going up; undefended pieces, loose king positions, pins, forks, skewers, etc. The more of those red flags you see, the more you should be open to shots from the dark. Obviously, in this case, the king position is super loose for black and there's a good chance mate might be in the air somewhere, so you should be extremely alert to it.

The more surprising part for me is that after you play Qg5+, you know you have a perpetual guaranteed. You can literally spend all your remaining time to see if there's something better here. This is just general competitive strategy; you're freerolling at this point to find something better. In this case, assuming you have time, there's nothing stopping you from taking the computer approach and just looking at each legal move one at a time if you want.

I dislike this opening incredibly for white because it's a trap opening that has little going for it other than surprise value

With 7 days per move you should start by looking for a win every time it's your move. It's only when you are low on time that you need to take shortcuts like carrying your evaluation with you from move to move.

Don't see a problem with this opening. I did face it once in the 1995 World Open and it was a complete surprise to me. My opponent missed a winning line in a position I was confident that he did not have enough compensation. It's very easy to underestimate White's attack after winning 3 pawns or more. Taking the pawns looks incredibly risky to me now, and even 4...Nc6 is suspect as a result. I don't play 2...d6 anymore, but it would be pretty annoying considering I play 2...d5 against the proper Alapin.

1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. c3 Nf6 4. Be2 Nc6 5. d4 cxd4 6. cxd4 Nxe4 7. d5 Qa5+ 8.
Nc3 Nxc3 9. bxc3 Ne5 10. Nxe5 Qxc3+ 11. Bd2 Qxe5 12. O-O Qxd5 13. Rb1 e6 14.
Qa4+ Bd7 15. Qf4 Be7 16. Bf3 Qxa2 17. Bxb7 Rb8 18. Ra1 Qb2 19. Rab1 Qe5 20.
Qxe5 dxe5 21. Be3 a5 22. Ba7 O-O 23. Bxb8 Rxb8 24. Ba6 Bb4 25. Rfc1 Kf8 26. Rc7
Ke7 27. Kf1 Rb6 28. Rd1 Bd6 29. Ra7 Rxa6 30. Rxa6 Bb5+ 31. Kg1 Bxa6 32. Ra1 Bb4
33. f3 Bc5+ 34. Kh1 Bb6 35. Rb1 Bc7 36. Kg1 a4 37. Rb4 Bd3 38. Rxa4 Bb6+ 39.
Kh1 e4 40. Rb4 e3 41. Rxb6 e2 0-1

Understood that it has value in that sense; I'm just generally against playing openings that the top GMs don't play. I took a quick look at when filtering for 2600+, I only found 16 games in the last 5 years that used these as the opening four moves.

Maybe it's dumb, but I'm a big believer in standing on the shoulders of the giants; openings like this always feel to me (especially with white) like you get the guy the first time, and subsequently your opponents are ready for it, leaving you just playing a substandard position.

This is a good idea to some extent, in that you definitely won't be playing garbage. But 2600s play generally against other 2600s, and commonly in round robin events. They generally have time to prepare before games, and are playing against known opponents. While I often play in events where the pairings are not done until 10 minutes before the round, and many players have few or no games in the database. In high level chess black is usually happy to play lines that allow white to force a draw in the opening, even allowing this to be known in advance. I don't recommend doing this in swiss events against lower rated opponents.

In this particular opening I don't see a good way to punish white's play. Worst case he gets an Alapin where black has committed to ...d6. Maybe substandard compared to main lines, but no more so than the regular Alapin.

which I also dislike