potato installation problem

[Lee Malatesta <brokeninside@freewwweb.com>]

I've been trying to install potato from a hard drive.  

I've downloaded the the entire 
	/dists/frozen/main/binary-i386 
tree and the 
	/dists/frozen/main/source/base 
directory.

Install of the base system goes fine.  But when its time
to specify the location of the debian mirror, I point it
at /mnt/hdc1 (the hard drive I have the debian tree on)
and it gives me an error:

	When I tried to access the debian archive
	using the information you provided, apt gave
	the following error.  I will run through the
	question again, try to correct the error.

	E: Encountered a section with no Package: header
	E: Problem with merge list
	/var/state/apt/lists/_mnt_hdc1_dists_frozen_main_binary-i386_Packages
	E: The package lists or status file could not be 
	parsed or opened.

The file _mnt_hdc1_dists_frozen_main_binary-i386_Packages
does exist and it looks to the untrained eye to contain 
package information.

I'd greatly appreciate some help getting potato installed.

An ftp install isn't an option for me.  I've got a slow
(56k) connection and my free provider (www.freewwweb.com) 
has a six hour time limit on connections.

regards,

lee