now from way-out in left field

So I know you can open up 4 or more virtual desktops in X.  And I know
you can open up any number of terminals.  But I sort of like the nice
clean look and feel of a plain old vtty for many tasks.  Unfortuately,
X, it would seem, steals all the F-keys, and the screen it would seem.
 Is there any slight of hand I can do to switch between X on vtty1 and
my other enabled vtty's?  I've also had KDE lock up solid (as I result
I'm evaluating gnome), and that would be a good method to fix things,
instead of the power switch, I would think.  Obviously, I've marked
myself as a noob, and not to step on toes, but ctrl-alt-del on winNT's
generally does get one the task manager, unless you are bluescreened.
If I'm on a tty I feel reasonalby sure I can kill anything locked.
Unfortunately, the modern world needs X sometimes, lynx only goes so
far, but then I'm at X's mercy, follow me?  Ok, I'll shut up now.
Have mercy on my opinions ;)

Steve