this is indeed, pretty damn weird. I'm going to go with uninstalling pop os, and getting windows first on the smaller drive, then getting either KDE Neon or Linux Mint on the bigger one. kinda sucks, i wish i couldve just installed but it doesn't seem like there is anything i can do. thank you so much for the help, comrade.
at this point i am considering uninstalling Pop and getting win10 first because linux actually has sensible ways to dual boot even on the same drive. that's probably what i'll have to do.
legitimately, yes, i do, to make sure i am gendering them correctly. especially if i had a client that didn't display pronouns.