not going to lie after reading all of your responses, i deleted my hotmail and switched to gmail. Had to setup the filter to stop the god awful delivery reciepts from showing up, but i found my answers on this site as well! I'm so glad I became a member of this site! Thanks for all of your help, it was great!
I know this guy has already got his answer, but I couldn't help but mention that I think gmail is the only one that permits you to also sync your contacts and calendar (via Google Sync)