This is a two part question:

In my limited time with WSS it looks like this search is limited only to the site you are in. Is their anyway I can perform cross searches of other WSS sites? I know this is possible in SPS's search engine and understand it is a completely different search engine.

Until recently my WSS search was property functioning. Now, it returns no results for the very basic of terms within the site. Any suggestions on what I can do to get this up and running would be greatly appreciated.