I’ll second Pop!_OS! Been using it as a daily driver since 2022 and have had a painless gaming experience the past year or so using lutris (league) and steam.
I use an Amd cpu and a nvidia gpu, if that helps at all.
I think the fix for the phantom drain came with the newest refresh (gen 3); I don’t notice a rapid drain when I sleep mine, though because I use the ‘deep sleep’ workaround.
I have been using a Framework 13 (12th gen intel) since April and I love it. The only complaint is the battery life (5-8 hours of software development with JetBrains IDEs), but in terms of hardware performance, it’s fantastic.
Making more frequent, smaller trips might make it less of a pain? Maybe stop by the dumpster if it’s on the way to/from a daily route you need to take?
Find the owner and tell them the cat is shitting on your property. If they tell you to pound sand, call city/county animal control to see what your options are. Alternatively, pick the shit up before your robot lawnmower runs it over.