A Tale of Two Hands...

So my session last night was kind of frustrating. Playing 2/5 NL at Harrah's in KC, things started off very well. In fact I had the absolute, pre-flop wet dream scenario play out for me. Here's how it went.
The Dream:
Full 10-person table, and the guy UTG opens up for $20, which is a smaller than usual bet. There are 6 callers to me and I look down at A-A in the big blind. I absolutely have to thin out this table, so I raise to $100. The guy UTG smooth calls the $100 after some deliberation, and then second to act GOES ALL IN! YES! He pushes his last $225 into the middle and the table folds to me. At this point I've got all the action I need, one player heads up to the flop, plus theres over $200 of dead money in the pot already. I shove my remaining $450 in the pot and UTG quickly folds. Flop comes 5-5-A, YAHTZEE! I show the guy Aces Full, and he tosses his QQ into the muck. Ship it!

As sweet as that preflop action was, there was another hand which was the exact antithesis.

The Nightmare
Full 10-person table, and again UTG opens, this time for $25, much more standard. 4 callers to me, I'm on the button and look down at K-K. Again, I need to thin out this field, so I bump it to $100. SB folds, then BB announces all in for $350 total. Fold around to me, and I instacall ($250 into a $550+ pot against the short stack) and he shows me aces. Cold deck! I didn't hit, and he scooped the huge pot.

Those two hands essentially dictated my night. The Dream happened fairly early, and at that point I was running real well and felt like I was well on my way to a real nice session. I went on a long stretch where I didn't pick up any real hands and was relying on some aggressive play to pick up small pots just to stay even, then I picked up the KK. What I thought was gonna be the start of another run, turned out to be just the opposite as I spent the next two hours finding ways to lose $ with JJ, QQ, AQ, AK, etc. The session ended when the table closed, and after 4 hours and a bunch of up and downs I essentially broke even for the whole thing. Disappointing, but hey, it beats losing.