kitchen sink cause I'm too lazy to sort through this junk

lua/core/opts.lua

@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 -- better ui ------------------------------------------------------------------
-vim.notify = require("notify")
+if pcall(require, "notify") then vim.notify = require("notify") end
 -- o.colorcolumn = { 80 }
 
 -- buffer
@@ -34,7 +34,7 @@ o.softtabstop = tabwidth
 
 -- colorscheme
 o.termguicolors = true
-vim.cmd('colorscheme mellow')
+if pcall(require, "mellow") then vim.cmd('colorscheme mellow') end
 
 -- better editing -------------------------------------------------------------
 o.clipboard = 'unnamedplus' -- system clipboard (on unix like)