Looking pretty good hammer! Reminded me somewhat of civilisation
The fps is pretty good as well, but like you said, around 55~60. (1.3mhz, 256mb ram)

One odd thing I noticed was the flickering when the screen with all the text appeared. It stopped (fortunately), when the game actually started.

To answer you question about the text, a few words here and there, like what you did with the numbers next to the icons won't hurt that much. But large amounts, I've noticed, do. Better use graphical text (pictures)instead. Perhaps a bit more work, but it will pay off, and it looks much nicer in the end as well.