So if I want to store a (ser defined) setting that will remembered after the battery/power source has been removed from the PIC ..is EEPROM is my only option?

If so, I have a problemette...I presently have 256 bytes that already goes into EEPROM at program time..

Code:
Data 0,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1, _
  1,1,1,1,1,1,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,2,3, _
  3,3,3,3,3,3,3,3,3,3,3,3,4,4,4,4,4,4,4,4,4,4,4,5,5,5, _
  5,5,5,5,5,6,6,6,6,6,6,6,7,7,7,7,7,7,8,8,8,8,8,8,9,9, _
  9,9,10,10,10,10,10,11,11,11,11,12,12,12,13,13,13,13, _
  14,14,14,15,15,15,16,16,16,17,17,18,18,18,19,19,20,  _
  20,20,21,21,22,22,23,23,24,24,25,26,26,27,27,28,29,  _
  29,30,31,31,32,33,33,34,35,36,36,37,38,39,40,41,42,  _
  42,43,44,45,46,47,48,50,51,52,53,54,55,57,58,59,60,  _
  62,63,64,66,67,69,70,72,74,75,77,79,80,82,84,86,88,  _
  90,91,94,96,98,100,102,104,107,109,111,114,116,119,  _
  122,124,127,130,133,136,139,142,145,148,151,155,158, _
  161,165,169,172,176,180,184,188,192,196,201,205,210, _
  214,219,224,229,234,239,244,250,255
ok, my first problem is, there's 256 bytes there...which maxes my EEPROM out. (16F1828)

Now assuming i have no other way of storing a user chosen varaiable after the power has been removed (other than EEPROM), THEN I suppose I will need to forsake one of the 256 bytes in that table above ...therefore 255 bytes + 1 byte that the user chooses (& gets stored away when he presses a switch).

But how do I control all of this. In other words if I trim the above from 256 bytes, to 255 bytes to free up one byte of EEPROM space, then the 255 bytes will go straight into EEPROM as it does now ....but how do I store the remaining (user defined) byte in the last available slot of EEPROM?

Sorry for n00by flavour here...but a prolific search didn't yield much that I can digest/apply to this conundrum.