I also have this feeling that because I posted the dead blind, people are giving me less credit for a real hand - is this a real or imagined phenomenon? I dont think that they are going to give you less credit for a real hand but they might view you as a weaker or more agressive player who wants to play straight away and will put in dead money to do so.

Just wondering do you have any stats on villian from hud?

I would probably bet a little bit more on flop as 7x 9x are still probably calling at least one street, might check call turn as I cant see too many K's in his range after the flop call maybe K9 is you were unlucky. On the other side I can see 108 (less as you have 2 10's) and 86 showing up here aswell and you dont really want to let them draw for free but still I would check call the turn and re-evaluate on the river.