Linux package management systems have come a long way in the last 15 years. Most distros (of note) are based on apt or yum of which various update GUIs are available for point and click management.
For each package, you have the ability to lock a package, revert back an update, or fix the issue with the update.
With the powerful support inherent in the open source model, anyone googling the error message should be able to quickly fix any issue.
Using linux is a learning experience, and updates exist in all computer systems today, which is yet one blatant indicator that time marches on; we are involved with non-static constantly evolving systems (both our knowledge and our use patterns continue to evolve in addition with the distros themselves).
Try not to toss out the baby with the bath water Joe. You have a choice of course to stand static, however you lose the development fixes and new capabilities with your stubborn bad attitude toward progress, change and package updates, as well as placing yourself at risk with any of the exploits and issues inherent in your old distro, (which admittedly is probably low as a desktop system).
Break/fix for update issues is as trivial today as rolling back the update, or changing your boot GRUB2 to boot the old kernel (should you find a virualbox issue that precludes using one of your old virtuals with the UserTools for instance).
For assistance, I can refer you to visit the installfesters if you want to schedule your update when there will be someone available to assist? Of course, we are all on the edge of our chairs waiting to assist you with your Kubuntu Updates?
That's a nice distro BTW, but compared with Ubuntu's other distros, DOES have potential packaging issues (all of which ARE trivially fixable)! Let us prove it to you?