emacs: bar and fonts

[Luca Ferrari]

Hi,
first a font problem: I'd like emacs to keep the courier 18 bold font when it 
starts up, but I'm unable (it's like it uses another fonts), and thus I have 
to select it from the mule menu. My .emacs file is the following:

(custom-set-variables
  ;; custom-set-variables was added by Custom -- don't edit or cut/paste it!
  ;; Your init file should contain only one such instance.
 '(case-fold-search t)
 '(current-language-environment "UTF-8")
 '(default-input-method "rfc1345")
 '(transient-mark-mode t)
 '(truncate-lines t))
(custom-set-faces
  ;; custom-set-faces was added by Custom -- don't edit or cut/paste it!
  ;; Your init file should contain only one such instance.
 )
(add-to-list 'default-frame-alist '(foreground-color . "white"))
(add-to-list 'default-frame-alist '(cursor-color . "green"))
(add-to-list 'default-frame-alist '(background-color . "black"))
(load "ucs-tables")
(load "code-pages")
(setq default-truncate-lines t)
; abilita evidenziazione delle selezioni
(setq-default transient-mark-mode t)
; aggiungi sempre fine linea in fondo al file
(setq require-final-newline t)
(setq next-line-add-newlines nil)
; visualizza anche le colonne
(setq column-number-mode t)
; font da usare
(set-frame-font "-*-Courier-bold-*-*-*-18-*-*-*-*-*-*-*")
; dimensioni iniziali della finestra
(setq initial-frame-alist '((width . 100)(height . 40)) )

Does anybody knows how to fix the font size at the startup?
Moreover, after an upgrade (21.4.1) I've got the bar that shows the file name 
and status in the bottom that is blue! I cannot read anything in this way, 
anybody knows how to change its color?

Thanks,
Luca