Clickable thumbnail?

Hi, first of all, thanks for this great theme. The magazine style is exactly what I was looking for.
However, I think it would be even better if the small thumbnails on the main page were clickable. I think most people are used to click on the picture to get to the article, rather than clicking the “read more” text. Is there any chance you can implement that?

Additionally, is there a way to get rid of the categories listing at the right side? I’d much rather have the tag cloud instead.