Fyi: anyone who comes across this should know going to cm7 is wonderful, my experience is good, but I'd like to prepare everyone who hates bloatware but doesn't know how much they actually rely on it till it's missing. Cm7 doesn't have vzw's backup assistant available to it so any contacts that aren't gmail appropriated beware, you should take the time now to back them up with a third party app. Swype is easily returned and "my Verizon" in play to download. Titanium backup is invaluable if you like to back all your stuff up and now the paid version has the ability to sync with dropbox and or box...
Thank you all who continue to monitor and post here. I wanted to smash this phone into the ground before i flashed cm7, new life for an otherwise outdated phone.
update:
using vzw's backup assistant online saving the .csv and then importing it to your gmail account solves the contact problem if you've updated it recently. I have found that i can get rid of a lot of old contacts easily this way and "spring clean" my contact list.
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