Anyway I've experimented with my current puzzle long enough and it's time to ask all you smart people out there (who probably already know the answer in your sleep)
if i reference the %0 arg i seem to have options to either get the file name of the batch, ext, path, drive letter, etc.
all i am looking for is the name of the folder the .bat is in (the last part of %~dp0)
thanks in advance (i'm sure i'll have harder puzzles in the future)
