@Chip Bennett - That's actually a cool idea regarding sticky posts. I was going to mention that if you really wanted to, just remove the link and use the theme but I didn't put it out there in the open.

I'm not sure what that spot is for above the posts. I thought it was for the blog title or something but that stuff is in the header image. So I don't know. But if you have graphics skills, you could put something there on top of the image.