Take a look at nigel's site
www.winpicprog.co.uk , if offers the scematic for a programmer (P16pro40) and free windows software and tutorials to learn assembler.
secondly
www.microchip.com , the home of the pics offers a bunch of information.
A google search on 'Pic projects' gives a lot of usefull hits also.
A pic is NOT the same as a 386 chip, in fact, there a totally diffirent breed. The x86 is a microprocessor, a 'number crunsher' it is only a processing unit with a memory and databus, it relies on other components to do the actual I/O adn storage of data.
A pic is a complete computer on a single chip, it has ROM (or flash), RAM, rocessing unit, I/O, all on chip, so no external parts are required (except for a oscillator). As a result, it isn't nearly as powerfull as a 386 but it doesn't need to be, as it will spend it's life doing simple controlling functions, not running windows