As stated in the title -- nothing more than a big THANK YOU to the Ubuntu MATE team for delivering an exceptional experience! Stable, easy to use, and reliable distribution since I have moved over. Also, finding the MATE Desktop I FINALLY feel like a GUI existing in 2024 has not alienated me!!
To add some context, a bit about my history with computers (I commented this on another post so I hope it's ok here - I believe this all deserves its own topic). I was a Windows user for my entire life until Windows 10, which worked like, well, insert negative expletive here. After this, I switched to Mac for several years and, although very stable, it wasn't quite for me. So when my Mac bit the dust, I bought a new laptop, found out what "Linux" was and distro-hopped to seemingly my heart's content, trying to find what worked for me and basically understanding "Linux is customisable, you can do whatever you want". Tried various distributions (Ubuntu and flavours, Arch, Debian, Rocky, openSUSE, etc. etc.) and various desktop environments (Gnome, KDE, XFCE, LXDE, etc. etc.).
Through this process, I learned that something in common with Windows 10, Mac, KDE, Gnome, and others, is I HATED the "modern" or "contemporary" GUI experience. I wanted something that was familiar and traditional, with menus and not so many tabs, and less animations and notifications, and something (with all due respect) that does NOT make me feel that I'm using my smartphone on my computer (I will never understand how that UI concept got so popular).
Then I discovered MATE -- the desktop that made me feel like it was made for me! Something that works modern but looks traditional and familiar. I fell in love with using my computer again under this DE.
Then I set out to find the most "authentic" MATE distribution and landed here. Ubuntu MATE. And WOW - it is an experience unlike any other on my Linux journey. Very stable, works so well but feels familiar and comfortable to someone who used XP and the like earlier in life and loved that way of using a GUI -- I'm sure if I used Linux in the Gnome 2 days I would have been in heaven.
And here I am -- Ubuntu MATE. I have many thanks to give for the developers and supporters for what has been the best distribution I have used thus far.
Hopefully there are others in the community who are equally as happy that they found their place here.
Cheers all!