I also bought a Hakko recently and should've done it decades ago.
Temperature control solves a great many problems.
Wear eye protection. One little spatter can ruin your whole day.
VENTILATE -- a little computer box fan and a piece of dryer flex pointed out a window with a towel filling the gap is enough to carry the fumes away. This isn't to avoid annoyance but to avoid cumulative damage. Your eyes and your breathing will both be happier without dealing with volatiles.
VENTILATE -- lead and zinc both boil out of solder, changing the mix so the melting point becomes unreliable.
"Zinc fume fever" feels like having a case of the flu, it will happen the day after you breathe too much zinc fumes. I've done this to myself soldering copper decades ago. The lag time is enough you may not realize what happened.
Lead vapor becomes lead dust, don't let that accumulate in any house where children may ever be present.
If you're soldering (or brazing) non-electrical connectors with a corrosive instead of a rosin flux --- a little cup of boiling water (like one of those teacup coil heaters or a tiny coffeepot) can be very handy; boiling (really, boiling) water will make flux pop right off a freshly soldered or brazed connection that's still hot, leaving it clean so it doesn't corrode later on.
