1-The biggest hurdle is getting assigned a classroom date. Once you're done with the initial time on data, the classroom, and the lab, typically you'll get somewhere around 2 to 3 hours OJT a day, but that's assuming you're rotating with your trainers. Somewhere between 12 to 18 months from the time you hit the floor is about average for most successful trainees. The more experienced, and sharper trainees have made it in less than a year, though not the norm. (This is for the EWR area, though I believe it is not far off on the other areas).
2-My typical paycheck is about 6k take home, but I don't work all the overtime available, and don't get Sunday pay. I'm at the salary cap. For reference, our biggest overtime whore in the EWR area is also at the salary cap, gets Sunday pay, works 10 hour days pretty much every day, 6 days a week, and he consistently nets over 9k with the highest paycheck I've seen at 9.7k take home. He came from MIA and even though that's also a level 12 he said he's almost doubling his take home pay here.