A few hopefully useful comments on the actual meat from a fellow traveller…
Much of the per-terminal key customising can be neatly handled with `zkbd`[zshcontrib(1)], which will also guide you with a wizard when you fire up zsh on a terminal type you haven't used before.
zsh also comes with builtin float support, so a whole heap of `bc` things can be replaced with arithmetic expressions such as `$(( x * 2.54 ))`. You can even up your game when you want more with the `zsh/mathfunc` module[zshmodules(1)], which basically just exposes math.h to the shell user.
One of my favourite options which isn't mentioned in TFA is warn_create_global, which very visibly warns you when you've forgot to scope a variable correctly. It would flag $CUT and $VULNS in `ports-check` for example.
¹ At least that is what a guy with a pink-haired pet tiger wandering a forest once promised me in a fever dream.