Password management help needed

[Phat Mack]

I'm overrun with internet and application passwords. Some aren't that critical, like those for freebie email accounts. Others are for financial and personal information that could have catastrophic results if they were compromised or fell into the wrong hands.

I tend to re-use passwords for different levels of needed security. I don't know if this is a good idea. Has anyone developed any techniques for generating and securing passwords? I was thinking of creating a plain txt document, logging all my passwords on it, and then zip-encrypting it or pgp encrypting it. However, I don't want to reinvent the wheel--has anyone solved this problem? I don't want to use any security measures with back doors.