I think personal happiness can be assured by these two things: a.) I wrote my first program! (To be fair, I copied it directly as I was supposed to, paying careful attentin to what I was doing, so I know what each line of code means. Leading to 2....) b.) Figured out how to hold the screen up so I can see the results Okay, that part was *not* in the program, so I couldn't see if it worked, so I went looking and found the system command in the Dev C++ complier. But is it *supposed* to stay open without the system command? Because seriously, I thought I did it wrong. ...maybe I did? Except I checked character by character and seriously,no. BUT I WROTE IT! AND IT CALCULATES A PAY RAISE! AND... God. I need a life . (And I don't even have to do it until class tomorrow in lab! I just--wanted to see if I could yet. So I am done! Except I'm retyping it in lab and everything because then I look like one of the Really Scary Obsessive Students, which I am going for. Must remember to wear glasses and look stern.)