Any time you play a live game, you better NOT be playing against a  person assisted by an engine or database.  If you suspect it, alert the admins and they will investigate.

Unlike ONLINE games where opening explorer use is fine,  a LIVE game (any time control) is policed quite strongly by the admins and cheaters don't usually survive too long ... so the odds are very likely that most of your opponents will be giving you a fair fight.

Now after taking that into consideration, here's a  time control breakup suggestion to practice what you've learned via live-games:

For every 1 x Slow game (+30 or +45 min games with delay/increment, play around 5 short blitz games with a 5-second delay.

The advantage of the former is that you are giving yourself time to really dig deep and analyze critical positions in your games and this "slow burn" will cement patterns into your memory more effectively than faster games.

The advantage of the latter (blitz games) is that you get to practice your opening lines and test your pattern recognition to play tactically safe moves under duress (in this case, the time-situation on the clock).

Saying "I'm not quick at blitz, so I will not play it" is self-defeating. Everyone starts out SUCKING at blitz. Then ... surprise, suprise ... they get better as their slow-chess skills progressively get better ... and the benefits (especially with a time-delay/increment) are worth it.

Most strong players I know always follow a healthy diet  of slow + blitz games.

Thanks Shivsky, I've seen your posts before, hard to miss ole' Dastardly Dan up there.  

Sounds live excellent advice, one that I didn't think of. Those are the very concepts I wanted to address.  So I'll do it to see if it helps any.  And if the guy is winning with an MCO on his lap, I guess I need to study mine a little more b4 the game.

Thanks, Thomas