Thank you to all who responded/read this post. I'm feeling better about things now. I went over the project last night with my boss and he was more helpful and engaged and less random. I respect him a lot so I always try to do things his way. I need to learn to take him less seriously. I also need to keep him more engaged in my work--but not TOO close either, because then he becomes a total control freak. As of last night, I've got code that does all of the functions I dreaded figuring out the most and am hopeful that things will be a bit smoother from now on. Yay!