In regards to Litecoin, I thought about mining then decided screw it i'll just buy a bunch. Then realized that getting USD into BTC-E as a Canadian is way too much work!
Have you thought about using
https://www.cavirtex.com/ first top buy bitcoins then turn those into litecoins. Haven't used it myself yet but at least they seem to be based in Canada.
My biggest Bitcoin related problem is the time it takes for a transaction to be confirmed.