Wow, I must say that is a great comment! You've hit quite a few things on the head. I had my friend help me with my first batch, so I think we addressed most of what you said. But, here are my comments:

I'm doing a partial grain wort. I do use the steeping bags, like you mentioned. I crack the grains when I buy them (the store has a mill to use) and put them into the bags. I throw them into the cold water and bring it to a boil. Depending on the recipe, you may leave it in the boil a while. A note from my friend: Make sure to not let the bags touch the bottom of the pot or you'll melt them. Find something metal to raise it off the bottom of the pot by just a bit.

I'm using plastic buckets for now. We'll see how they work out. I might consider moving to glass carboys eventually. I think as long as you take care of the plastic buckets and make sure not to scratch them, you should be okay.

My friend talked about aerating the wort. Very important. I basically mixed it vigorously while I poured the liquid yeast into the fermentation bucket.

Dry Hopping sounds interesting. Could you expand on that a bit? With this stout recipe, we had two hops. One was thrown into the wort for like 15 minutes, and another was thrown in for the last 5 minutes. If I remember correctly, one was for bitterness and the other was for aroma.

My friend recommended the Irish Moss for my next batch. We didn't do it in this batch. I noticed my next recipe I want to do calls for it, so I'll see how it works out. My friend also suggested gelatin, which he said really helps attract the yeast.

As I mentioned before, I'm definitely going to try a secondary fermentation so I can cut down on the amount of yeast. Just need to pick up another sealable bucket.

Even with my first batch just finished, I'm already looking at kegging solutions. They look like the way to go. I'm watching an ebay auction of a kegerator that somebody put together. It's pretty cheap right now and the seller is local. Might let my friend take it, though, since it's a full-size fridge and he has a house (as opposed to my condo).

I've found tons of recipes on the web. I think it's just a matter of making them and figuring out what affects the taste. There's some good sites online that mention the overall aromas and tastes that hops and barley lend to a beer. I'll definitely be studying those.

I already have the bible. It's a great book. Tons of recipes and other information.