I dont think i found the post you are refering to but i have picked up a few things. I just want to clarify some of them.

Can i connect an IR sensor directly to a serial port without a PIC chip? That link i posted earlier has an example that may or may not work.

Do i need to buy a specific sensor? I have a few laying around. Wont any of those work?

What about sending too. I assume that if question 1 is a yes then this one would be really simple. Just the transmitter and a resistor connected to TX?