-> this way I can inhale the troublesome document into a new template
-> based on the vanilla normal.dot.
JR> How do you create this vanilla normal.dot and where do you keep it?  Is
JR> it just an extra copy of your Normal.Dot?
  It is a copy of a brand new install with no macros or styles added.
You can achive the same by making a copy of the existing to a subdir
of \workdot.  Load Word, Open the Template Normal.dot;  go into
Tools|Macro|Organizer.
 You will be deleting all Styles, Toolbars, AutoText and Macros.
Then you have to go into Tools|Options and reset all to defaults.
Save the template to a \vanildot subdir. Quit Word, copy the
normal.dot in \workdot back to \templates. You're done - sort of.
 The problem is there is no way to reset to "defaults"  - such a
choice does not exist. This is why one should have a copy of a
vanilla normal.dot  Incidentaly, there is no reason why a vanilla
normal.dot from one machine isn't suitable for another for the same
version of Word.
Good Luck!
   
 * PMDBM  V1.75b #14 *
--- PCBoard (R) v15.23/M 5
---------------