I have a coworker who swears on ArchLinux, but is the OS alluded to in one of the replies below. This is supposed to give what you exactly need, no more and no less, i.e. no crapware/bloatware, etc, but of course steep learning curve and all that jazz. Personally I use Debian as I am not as daring (and sometimes Ubuntu, as it has some favourable features like command line tab-completions preconfigured) . More important for me is the minimalistic i3 window manager that helps navigation between windows extremely smooth. I am playing with Qubes these days. It helps separate your activities into different Qubes for security (each Qube will have its own border colour). Clipboard transfer between these Qubes can be restricted, so you can relatively securely have your work and personal qubes on the same machine. I like it that i3 customized for Qubes is also there.

There is something else that could affect our electronic civilization that has a much higher probability, in fact more than most people think, and we will likely be ill prepared for it just like the last pandemic: Coronal Mass Ejections (CME). Put your backups in a Faraday cage! Which institutions and systems are prepared enough?