Upgrade Catch-22

["Greg Wiley" <greg@orthogony.com>]

Argh.

I have a Woody machine that attempted
to go through an upgrade last night and
is now in dpkg jail.

ppp tries to upgrade but bails with:

    Unpacking replacement ppp ...
    depmod: Unexpected value (20) in '/lib/modules/2.4.9-686/kern
    el/drivers/ieee1394/sbp2.o' for ieee1394_device_size
            It is likely that the kernel structure has changed, if so then
            you probably need a new version of modutils to handle this
            kernel.
            Check linux/Documentation/Changes.
    dpkg: warning - old post-removal script returned error exit status 255
    dpkg - trying script from the new package instead ...
    [ same depmod err as above]
    dpkg: error processing /var/cache/apt/archives/ppp_2.4.1.uus-1_i3
    86.deb (--unpack):
     subprocess new post-removal script returned error exit status 255
    [ same depmod err as above]
    dpkg: error while cleaning up:
     subprocess post-removal script returned error exit status 255
    Errors were encountered while processing:
     /var/cache/apt/archives/ppp_2.4.1.uus-1_i386.deb
    E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)

But trying to remove ppp balks with:

    dpkg: error processing ppp (--remove):
     Package is in a very bad inconsistent state - you should
     reinstall it before attempting a removal.
    Errors were encountered while processing:
     ppp
    E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)

So I can neither go forward nor back.

Upgrading modutils directly claims I have the most recent
version.  I am using the 2.4.9-686 kernel image from the
Woody distribution.  I don't have a firewire device, nor
is the module listed in my module config.  I don't even
need ppp on this machine.  I could ignore this error but
it is holding up the upgrade of ~50 other packages.

Any nudges in the right direction are greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

   -=greg

BTW, I broke up some of the quoted lines above so they
don't exceed normal term width.  Is there a convention
for reporting long-line output in email?