For the first question, maybe i'm missing the point, but for a peice of Macaroni I would woud

1. Creat-Nurbs Primitive-cylinder
2. Go to your Attributes and change the Spans from 1 to something like 8 or so. This will give you bending room.

3. Shape as you will.


For the second question, once you have your macaroni shaped you can

1. go to Modify-Convert- Nurbs to polys (to convert nurbs to polys obviously)

2. Use the Poly tool to add Edges and Vertices wherever you want them. (if you can't figure out how to do this, watch the "Cartoon Dog" tuts, Kurt does it in the second one, i think)

Also, by right clicking the polygon you have a choice of several selection options: by face, vertices, edges, etc.

I've only been modeling for a couple days ,but I hope I helped!

Cheers!