yes, hugs hugs hugs

sorry about the “geek” thing. it was a compliment. i love geeks :)

i ran the grep and it worked!!!

it found the text i needed, and i love that you didnt include the commas. xxoo. and not finding a straight ' is fine too since i dont think my editor knows how to make one if she tried ;). 

the style also found

, an ’80s mixer with Alpha Psi Fraternity and bowling with Tau Kappa Epsilon Fraternity.—Natalie,

which isn't a big deal since i will probably use Change/Find rather than Change All to be safe

xtra hugs

thank you so much. your explanation of what each expression defines is very helpful.

Although your solution worked for what I requested (I did put in the backslashes), I realize now that I didn't give you enough information.

I am wanting to take the text:

Figure 1-1: Photo was taken with a Canon EOS 1D Mark III Camera, 70 – 200 mm lens at 145mm, 1/320 sec, f/4.5 and ISO 200, in manual exposure mode.

or

Figure 1-1: Photo was taken with a Canon EOS 1D Mark III Camera, 70 – 200 mm lens at 145mm, 1/320 sec, f/4.5 and ISO 200, in manual exposure mode.

and convert it to

Figure 1-1: Photo was taken with a Canon EOS 1D Mark III Camera, 70–200mm lens at 145mm, 1/320 sec, f/4.5 and ISO 200, in manual exposure mode.

With your solution, I was getting all instances of any number with a mm following the number and not necessarily containing a hyphen or it was finding the numbers following the word Figure (i.e. Figure 1-1:)

I tried messing around with it myself some but I ended up getting 70 – —2mm :)

thank you so much. your explanation of what each expression defines is very helpful.

Although your solution worked for what I requested (I did put in the backslashes), I realize now that I didn't give you enough information.

I am wanting to take the text:

Figure 1-1: Photo was taken with a Canon EOS 1D Mark III Camera, 70 – 200 mm lens at 145mm, 1/320 sec, f/4.5 and ISO 200, in manual exposure mode.

or

Figure 1-1: Photo was taken with a Canon EOS 1D Mark III Camera, 70 – 200 mm lens at 145mm, 1/320 sec, f/4.5 and ISO 200, in manual exposure mode.

and convert it to

Figure 1-1: Photo was taken with a Canon EOS 1D Mark III Camera, 70–200mm lens at 145mm, 1/320 sec, f/4.5 and ISO 200, in manual exposure mode.

With your solution, I was getting all instances of any number with a mm following the number and not necessarily containing a hyphen or it was finding the numbers following the word Figure (i.e. Figure 1-1:)

I tried messing around with it myself some but I ended up getting 70 – —2mm :)