The image playback can be turned off or set to 1.5 seconds or longer or can be set to stay on until you touch something (like the shutter button). I sometimes turn it off altogether but often leave it on for 1.5 seconds. Come on just long enough to see if I have some horrible disaster happening in the shot but reverts back to the OVF pretty fast. I love the little trick of looking through the OVF for the shot, having the EVF take over momentarily to show you what you've shot, and then switching back to the OVF automatically and quickly. Nice little piece of engineering in that and after a couple of days I was taking it for granted - life's not fair that way!
The OVF should not take ages to come on. Turn off all energy saving settings and turn on "quick startup" or whatever its called. Set it to never ever go to sleep - it really doesn't like waking up. Just turn it off if you're not shooting for long enough to want it to go to sleep. You can turn it on a LOT faster than it will wake up from a nap - very cranky that way. And carry an extra battery as the price to pay for all of that lack of energy savings. When I turn my camera on and raise it to my eye, the OVF comes up the moment it recognizes that my eye is to the viewfinder and it switches from the screen on back to the viewfinder. As close to instant as I could want.
No, not for beginners, and yes, a TON of fun to shoot with. Your images show the camera's capabilities well. Love those daisies!
-Ray