» Wed Dec 07, 2011 2:28 pm
Don't forget there's a choice of 44 Followers, not including annoying mutts that never Please continue, my good sir. (and count as "extra" Followers anyway). I'm actually surprised at the number of people that seem to stay with Lydia since she is almost always the second or third Follower you will come across, and the second free one. Perhaps Bethesda wasn't clear enough in the NPC dialogue options when someone can become a Follower. What I'm getting at is that there is a LOT of choice for you and the more quests you complete the more Followers become available. There's no reason why you couldn't, literally, replace your Follower every other level.
When you "fire" a Housecarl, or tell them to Wait so long that they get bored and go home, they will return to your house, or the keep if you don't yet have a house, in the Hold they belong to and will still have all the same items and equipment when you decide to drag them around again. I cannot be sure, but I assume it is the same case for other types of Followers.
I have never had a Follower get lost "for hours", but they do occassionally run into pathing issues and can get stuck on rocks. In dungeons they can also be hit by traps and find themselves dragged/thrown/pushed into walls (swinging blade traps most often). The best solution is usually to Wait or transition to another area, either by going through a door or by fast traveling. If they really are getting lost for hours, and you have not told them to Wait somewhere, despite multiple transitions, then that is a bug that should be reported. In a similar vein, I'm not sure what has happened to my Whiterun Horse since I haven't seen him for a while, despite multiple fast travels, but he did have a penchant for attacking Giants and Dragons so...
Erandur doesn't have Destruction as one of his skills. He has Restoration, Conjuration, Speech and Alchemy. If you're quite happy to heal yourself, I would try Onmund or J'Zargo as they both have the interesting combinations of Destruction, Illusion, One-Handed and Heavy Armour. If you do need someone to heal you, I would go with Marcurio because he has Destruction, Restoration, Alteration, Conjuration and Sneak (there are others with this combination of skills, but they are not so easy to get and are locked behind quests).