I look at it this way: you made minimal investment to make sure that the truck could continue to serve your needs. You really do need a tailgate so that's acceptable. Depending on your health, living location and needs, fixing the AC is reasonable and so you didn't spend money on new rims you protected the old rims. All acceptable.
The vent shades are the only thing that could be considered "unnecessary" in my opinion.
Aside from that nice little truck. Sadly "midsize" trucks today are the size of full sizes back when I was a kid. I always liked that model of S10.
