Best house rules!

[order99]

I've read that rule-it more or less treats spells in the book as scrolls,letting you fast-cast the same way and erasing the spell...since it's easier to copy a spell than write a scroll,i've always assumed the two were different and disallowed it.
In my campaigns,"memorizing" a spell was more or less casting it,leaving a few key portions unfinished,and allowing the MU to trigger the spell quickly later.So a Ritual Cast is pretty much an immediate memorization/casting with the unused energy the MU set aside for the day. I had one PC enjoy the freedom of the Ritual Cast so much that he'd start every day with empty spell slots and improvise from there-of course,he'd select one or two combat spells if the party was headed into obvious danger.
When the party heckled him for his choice of casting,the MU would cheerfully reply"Never underestimate the value of an open mind". ;D

[foster1941]

Sort of like the idea of "linchpins" from Roger Zelazny's second series of Amber novels? I like it. For combat spells or other spells that need to be cast in a hurry (feather fall, etc.) you'd want to be able to activate it as quickly as possible so you'd take the time to 'memorize' (i.e. pre-cast) it in advance except for the key linchpins, but for non-combat spells where time isn't so much a factor you might as well cast the entire spell on the spot (taking 5 or 10 minutes), trading efficiency and speed for versatility. Of course that also means you have to carry your spellbook(s) with you, which if you use the BtB spellbook sizes from UA is a significant load (my magic-user character in a current PbP game has such a low Str score that carrying her spellbook and nothing else is enough to drop her down to the 6" encumbrance class!).

[order99]

Funny you should mention Amber...that's where the inspiration came from,the Merlin series to be precise.And the RPG of course.It just seemed to make more sense than the purely Vancian model(badly named IMHO,as Vance only used that casting style in a few books).
The spellbooks are a pain...a MU will most likely reduce his travelling load by choosing a sampling of the more likely spells-again,limiting him/her a bit.Using wands and staves lets the MU concentrate a bit more on non-combat spells of course.
Never corner a Mage in his lair though...he'll have access to every spell he's got,given time!

[godentag]

No halflings...no regrets!

(haven't allowed them since they stopped being played as hobbits and became 'snarky/kewl'...thanks so much, Tracy Hickman!)

You want a little guy PC IMC, then play a gnome or a midget!