ell I might be going against the consensus but for just breadboard use, a Nano board is the cleanest solution
I do not think you are running against the wind, but I see a lots of newbies fry their uC by doing those silly things like trying to use relays directly from the I/O or trying to drive a LED without a resistor. With the UNO, the fix is to simply replace the uC with a new Atmega328P-PU. The Nano boards are a bit more complex requiring an oven or hot-air rework.
Ray