I've got a VPS, now what M's should I RTF?

[Steven]

As the subject line says, I now have a bright shiny new (small) virtual 
private server. For the moment I've done what seems the most obvious 
first step: getting it set up to log in using SSH and a non-root account 
so I have to sudo before most easily shooting myself in the foot. The 
second step being to go for advice without mentioning company names or 
IP addresses in the same email as what would otherwise amount to, "Hi 
I'm a newbie admin, easy box to crack here." :}

As I do consider RTFM do be a decent answer, does anyone have some 
preferred, "How not to be an idiot with your new VPS," guides?

As for what I plan to do with it I will probably start with having an 
outside the apartment place to keep a copy of things I'm putting under 
version control, and then some lightweight personal web serving.