Thanks to all! I will put my class defs first (tho not without expressing my disappointment that this is required in a late 20th century language); learn about enumerate as it looks like exactly what I need and discard my C++/Java based object model because this is a totally other thing.
If someone who knows both object models would comment on Python's model v. C++/Java's model that would be helpful. -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
