[HotSauce]

I was just wondering if there was a FAQ that would help explain for the newbies (like me) all of the terms and whatnot used on this forum.

Stuff like:
Flash
Kitchen
Cook
ROM
Custom ROM
Brick
Hard Reset
Hard SPL

The reason I ask this is because I want to 'flash' my phone with a 'custom rom' but I'd like to know more about the process of it, and what happens. The "how to flash.." thread is good, but when I read the steps, they're just steps to me while I don't actually know what each step is doing to my phone. If I flash my phone, does it keep all of the files on my storage card? And if I had to return my phone or get it repaired, how would I restore it back to the stock settings so that it would be completely unidentifiably altered? Are there any risks involved?

Thanks.