Bob, I've sent you a PM on this so we won't clutter up the forum. I'll look forward to hearing from you.

Melanie, thanks for the reminder on pullup(s). I'm using the 16F87xA devices (so far), and the only open drain I see in the data sheet is RA4. Being a fussy creature of habit, I'll probably want to put 4.7K pullups on anything that resembles a parallel bus . . .