Vista: Managing Wireless Networks (annoyance)

I'm running Vista Home Premium on an HP dv2000t. I have four wireless networks set up on my computer.

1. Home, Secure (WEP), Non-broadcasting SSID.
2. My friend's, Secure (WEP), Non-broadcasting SSID.
3. School, Unsecure, Broadcasting SSID.
4. Classmate (and her roommates), Secure (WEP), Broadcasting SSID.

Before adding the 4th connection last Saturday (Feb 24th), the behavior of the others were fine, but not the best. I usually hibernate (but not always) when taking my computer from home to my friend's or school. At first, my connections were coming in automatically, even after hibernating. Then after that, I would have to click on the wireless network icon in the taskbar and refresh. "Unnamed Network" would turn into the appropriate SSID (non-broadcasting) and say "Acquiring IP address", and then it'd work.

Since last weekend, I now have to select "Unnamed Network" and manually enter SSID's and the security keys (which I keep on hand in a text file now). It will not find mine or my friend's SSID. All network properties have the following two checkboxes filled in: 1) Connect automatically when this network is within range, and 2) Connect even if the network is not broadcasting (with "Connect to a more preferred network if available" not being selected).

However, when I go to the classmate's, since the SSID is broadcasting, I only have to select it from the list of available networks, and the passkey is stored. Speaking of that. Their passkey was not made up of 26 characters, but instead I was told that the passphrase was "pizza".

1) Is this so-called passphrase, the same thing you enter in as your passkey before it is encrypted? (which would be easier so I don't have to store my passkey on my computer)

2) Why are my network connections acting this way now?

Thanks!