I didn't take your post as badmouthing Gentoo, I'm just unsure what is automated in Gentoo that's not automated in Gentoo. I'm not that familiar with Slackware.

Gentoo has a stable branch, you don't have to be bleeding edge. Its stable branch is more bleeding-edge than other distros' stable branches sometimes (although for example Gentoo's stable is still using GCC-3.4.4; 4.0 and 4.1 and 4.2 alpha are available for install but not marked stable), but Gentoo's stable branch isn't as bleeding-edge as other distros' testing branches at least.

One of Gentoo's strengths is that it lets you mix and match unstable and stable packages easily. Or install them in parallel, in many cases.

Another of Gentoo's strengths is that it DOESN'T force you to make a "devlopment computer" or "desktop computer" or "server computer". There are literally no such distinctions. You install things on the package level (and its depencies are installed automatically of course, but only the bare minimum you need to run the program). I'm sure Slackware is the same. Unbuntu for example installs all kinds of garbage by default, and you have no idea what you're getting.

My uptime was 1 and a half months, but then I bought a new computer.