FYI, you can unpin topics

Just click the little thumbtack next to the title. First thing I did was clean those up which reduces a lot of clutter.

Ahhhh, yes. That is much nicer… thanks!

What does it mean to “unpin topics?”

IIRC, Pinned topics here are what used to be called Announcements at the old site. They’re threads the mods could “pin” to the top of each forum. Here, they have a little pin icon next to them, so if you click on the pin, it’ll unpin itself. Next time you refresh or load the page, that thread will be absorbed into the flow of the forum and won’t be stuck at the top anymore, cluttering up the show.

That is good to know. Thank you!.
(I’m learning to adapt to change, slowly)

You can also set them to automatically unpin after reading in Preferences >> Interface. Not sure if that works for Globally Pinned threads or not.