O_o I survived?

I made it back on today during a lull in the day for a tour through Black Rise again.  Amazingly, I made it back out of lowsec in the Kestrel I brought in.  I first engaged a Republic Fleet Firetail.  At first I thought I would be able to get into my optimal range and keep him there.  Next thing I knew, he was 20 kilometers from me.  I did my best to get him back in range, however I forgot to keep my transversal up to mitigate some of the damage he was applying.  It hurt.

 
I managed to escape the battle in hull.  There's a first time for everything, I suppose.  I complimented the pilot on his speed and then asked why he didn't point me to keep me on the field.  He responded that he was reading at the time I engaged him and never bothered to turn on the point.

Ouch.  My ego.  Lol.

Next I dropped in on a Merlin and managed to set up on him perfectly.  I set up an orbit outside of his optimal after a little maneuvering, webbed and scrammed him down and starting chewing through his shields.  I also remembered to monitor my overheating mods, and turned off the heat on my scram.  That turned out to be the end of that engagement, as the Merlin slipped outside of my point range and warped off.  Shit.

After bouncing around a few more systems, I ran across two Condors in a novice plex.  I warped in and tried to catch the Condor that I followed through the warp gate, but no big surprise, he evaded me.  I made use of my practice with slingshotting to escape his point and GTFO, as I couldn't really see that engagement ending in my favour.

Now here I am docked up and frankly quite surprised at myself.  I don't think I've ever made it back with my ship intact when I go out looking for PVP on my own.  Not sure if happy?

What I learned:

- Republic Fleet Firetails.  Get some.  Those bitches be fast.
- Modify your orbit before turning off the overheat on your scram.  Or better yet, if you think you can end the engagement before your scram burns out, don't turn the overheat off at all.
- Fuck Condors.