yes, but I hate X windows even more than I hate Windows.
You can stop X then and run from CLI. Even in runlevel 5. You'll have to get a text based browser though to FReep, and you'll miss out on the pic intensive threads, but what the hey.
I don't know why you have a problem with X though. You have a choice of window managers. And SSHing into another system with X redirection allows you to run any GUI app from that machine, with the UI displayed on yours with no problems what-so-ever. No resource intensive VNC required.
I do it all the time, while I'm sitting on my couch with the laptop FReeping, and playing MP3's on my desktop via Amarok UI redirection. X is quite versatile.
The UNIX-Hater's Handbook has a chapter on X Windows.
It's a good read.
Well, X was designed from the outset as a distributed network system that just happens to use windowed views. It was never really envisioned nor intended as the user interface, which is why so many windows handlers exist. If you haven't found one you like, you haven't been looking. There are at least a dozen available.
Mark