Windows Vista introduces keyboard shortcuts for the Quick Launch icons
You can open any icon in the Quick Launch bar (just to the right of the Start button) by holding down the Windows key and pressing what I'll call the "rank number" of the icon - the number that corresponds to its position in the list. So, in the desktop here, Windows + 1 opens Outlook, Windows + 2 opens Internet Explorer, Windows + 5 opens the Snipping Tool and so on.