most of our ingredients are used in raw form, and remain as close as possible to their natural state. if the pattern of characters that you are searching for does not exist in the string then it will return the value of ‘true’ or else it will return ‘false’. not all authors get the choice, of course. this is exactly why we are showing this topic at this time. it is the lot of the youngest family members to experience the aging and death of the older generations while still young. mary ann, you capture so perfectly how i feel too! 