I could add an administrator setting: disable moderation queue notice; show with data from cache (may show incorrect numbers to some moderators; show with data queried from the database.
I haven't really looked into how soft delete works yet, but something unapproved threads/posts is missing, imho, is an admin/mod note area for the thread(s)/post(s) that are unapproved.
if this already exists, I must have missed it.