I am usually up on news and I had a political conversation with someone who isn’t. The person I was speaking with said talking to me was depressing.

Well, the subject matter, politics, is currently quite depressing.

I preferred Sealab 2021

IODD makes some. I had the older HDD version that stopped working after it got dropped, so now I use this one:

https://www.iodd.shop/IODD-SSD-drive-with-mini-USB-30-with-secure-256-bit-encryption

The olde ones are nice. Not sure about the newer ones. I have two T420s and one T430. The 420 was the last of the chicklet keys I think. Can swap CPU/RAM as well. The 430 has the CPU soldered in like most major brand laptops do meow.