[darthtrader]

Just get "Option Volatility & Pricing" by Sheldon Natenberg. Its so clear and well done i'm not sure why anyone else even bothers trying to write about options to explain them.
To hedge you could cover your position, 1 contract for ever hundred shares with atm puts long or sell covered calls. The bullish thing, there is a bunch you could do but alot would depend on what the greeks look like, Sheldon explains those perfectly. I remember someone telling me when I was trying to wrap my head around them that options are more 3 dimensional with a stock being 2 dimensional.
I think once you understand them enough though you will realize you don't really want to bother with them.