Hey, I'm just checking back every so often since I can't wait to see what SMF 2.0 will look like on ComputerHope's forums, but I noticed this post:
There are service monitor programs that you can use which will alert you (using multiple methods) when something goes "down". I use on my much-less-professional server.
You could even configure your computer to play a sound alert on emails fitting rules that may detect one of these service monitor status reports.
MySQL can be tricky when it gets stuck. It can end up eating a lot of memory as well...