>So the interesting part is, using the polling method, its much more 
>reliable..ie.....the slave PIC turns on a sequence of LEDs that shows 
>if the 8 bits was correctly recieved.  As I watch, most the time it 
>cycles correctly but now and then it either halts or skips LEDs. If 
>I look in the buffer I can see where the data pattern was lost.  
>Sometimes I get the address showing up where data should be...
>ie.....address = 0x80 and the buffer shows 0x80,0x50,0x30 correctly 
>but other times its 0x80,0x80,0x50..... etc
>   
>So here is the code snippits for the polling method, that is working 
>much better (maybe only by luck?)

I doubt that it is a code problem, but rather a noise problem.

How is your cable configured? If it is ribbon cable it needs to be 

1 - gnd
2 - SDA
3 - gnd
4 - SCL
5 - gnd

and may need to be shielded on top of that.

Personally I would use a twin twisted pair, or STP cable.

then go looking for software problems.
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