Two easy options come to mind:
1. keep an eye on blockchain.info and take your miners down when you see Slush get a block.. it updates automatically and there should be a fairly short lag.
Questions within questions... I'll work it out though

Since most pools use systems which discourage hopping your best bet is to leave your miners on a single pool (or point each of your individual gpus/whatever at a selection of pools) and leave them alone. If you're that bothered by the variance you should pick a PPS (pays the same per share everytime) pool.. although in most cases you'll pay a higher fee to the pool for the privilege.
I don't think PPS actually makes much sense for a pool. HHTT is just switching away from it as the pool funds rand down to 0 and people weren't getting paid.