Theme development

I'm new to Drupal and obviously in over my head. I was experimenting with eliminating the $content region and now I can't see anything. I tried to restore it in my theme but I can't seem to get Drupal to refresh my theme change.

So two questions:

1.) Is there a reason why Drupal isn't picking up my changes (restoring $content) in the theme?

2.) Is there a way to go back to the bluemarine using MySQL? I tried the following but it didn't work:
UPDATE variable SET value='s:10:"bluemarine";' WHERE name = 'theme_default'

TIA,

flanderz

I just need a little bit of help on applying the zebra affect on my comments.

I have already added to my comment.tpl.php file

<div class="<?php $zebra ?>">  
  ..........
  </div>

and to my style sheet

.comment .even {
	background:url(dashBG.png) repeat top left;
}

.comment odd {
	
}

When I do a view selection source i see the new class inserted but there is no value in it.

I just need a little bit of help on applying the zebra affect on my comments.

I have already added to my comment.tpl.php file

<div class="<?php $zebra ?>">  
  ..........
  </div>

and to my style sheet

.comment .even {
	background:url(dashBG.png) repeat top left;
}

.comment odd {
	
}

When I do a view selection source i see the new class inserted but there is no value in it.

Hi, I've decustomised the layout of the profile page according http://drupal.org/node/35728

I'm also using a custom profile field to be used in the Posted by ... messages.
http://drupal.org/node/64248

The header of the profile page still displays the user name and I would like to change this in the custom profile field so the user name is invisible.

I love all the features and power that Drupal gives me, but for my taste, I find that some of the Joomla templates are far more attractive than those available in Drupal. I would like to port some of them to Drupal, but I see some basic problems.

I have this situation on template.php:

several functions:

<?php

function phptemplate.function1 () {
  $var = 'one'; // at this point var = one
  $output = function2();
  $var .= $var; // at this point var should be onetwo but I couldn't get it!

  $output = $output.$var;

  return $output;
}

function phptemplate.function2 () {
  $var .= 'two'
  $output = 'something';
  return $output;
}

How can I do it? I tried declaring $var as global in function1 without success.