Dealing with updates

Hope springs eternal! Will this be the update that fixes that #$&*%^ problem?
Onyx appears to be releasing updates around four times a year for current products.
If you're running stock this probably doesn't cause many hiccups.
If you're a whole-hearted modder it probably brings a bit of dread too.
"Darn, I have to patch the boot image, rebuild sepolicy, patch a whole lot of stuff..."
Ok, there is also the simple fact of downloading 1.5 GB which may be a mountain for some.

As much as I make notes and have makefiles to do all the stuff, it seems that every step forward (update) is also a step backwards.
I updated my Poke3 to 3.2.4 on October 18 and it's taken me until now to say, "Yup, I fixed it all".

And you?