Confused by professions

I have been trying to ask in /2 but people aren't very helpful so I thought I would come to my favourite place :P

I am level 68 on 5 characters.

I want to add Alchemy to these five characters. Do you think it is worth it now? Or should I wait until after Cataclysm. I want to farm their CDs up until Cataclysm. Is this wise? Is it possible or have all of the CDs that make any profit been removed in the patch.

What can I transmute exactly, and how much do you think it would cost to train up my skill to the required transmuation level. Finally, how does profession levels work. Is it 5 levels per level you have?

So that means at level 68 I can only craft items under 68 * 5 = 340.

Is that correct?

Sorry for so many questions.

The crafting professions do not have the same leveling requirements as the gathering ones do - my lowest level alchemist is 65 with 450 skill. I beleive that you can't get the quest for the specialty bounus until 68. I have five 450 skill alchemists, and usually transmute epic gems every day (the new cooldown resets at midnight server time) and send them over to my jewelcrafter to cut them for the auction house. The best times for posting seem to be Tues nite for people getting gear from the reset raids and weekends.

There have been reports (that I haven't verified) of there not being the recipies for the epic gems on the trainers since the patch. I already know the transmutes so I haven't bothered to look. I'll take a look tonite and edit this once I find something out. *EDIT* Checked last night - epic gem transmutes are NOT there

If you are going to be buying the items needed to level, I don't know if you would get a return on your investment. If you have alts that you are leveling, you now get exp for gathering so that may be a way to go.

I stocked up on mats prior to the patch, and it cost anywhere from 30 to 50 gold for the raw mats to transmute epic gems. The uncut epic gems sell for about 80 - 100 gold, I have a 450 jewelcrafter and cut them into the most popular cuts which adds 20 - 40 gold to the price. You'll have to check the market on your server to figure your profit margin. It's rare to sell a gem for over 150 gold on my server.

Why would you wait, why do you think it will be faster to level up in Cata?

Generally there are fewer people in older zones when new stuff is released thus driving up the prices for old zone stuffs.

FYI, you can NOT learn the epic gem xmute from trainer since 4.0.1, no word from blizzard when this will be fixed (no blue post even acknowledges it, but ppl talked to gm said they're aware of it). Just leveled 2x alchemist, sigh.