*Trying* to be patient and wait for push so me (and a couple friends) can join in on the pool, just kind burns me that there are people in the pool (who I shall not name) who are complaining over nothing, when they are at least members.
GPU: ~78 Mhashes/s solo mining right now...
If you trust your friends you could just create a new pool for you and your friends by using jgarzik's
http://yyz.us/bitcoin/poold.py, it does not include cheating prevention and you'll have to figure out how to split the reward yourself, but it's a start :-)