Well, going ten years without learning regexes is pretty hard! I have a little 'cookbook' of regex formulae, I have every Perl book worth having, and a few that are worth nothing and much of the time I can work out the basics. If you really want to know the sad truth I am a mathematician who hd a heart attack at age 36 (I am not 52) and there are some areas in which I was most proficient which now baffle me totally. Other things i have no trouble with at all! Go figure.