>>Or, in this case, there's a path to a nonexistent location somewhere in the project. Most of the paths are relative to the path of the file in the first row, but there may be some absolute paths in it - so, check the first row, check for anything that contains a colon or \\. Fox will not report this as an error, it will search for the files along the current (internal) path, which is why it takes so long.
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>Thanks, but that is not what is happening. I don't have any paths set - nothing. I don't even have the PJX open yet. I'm actually doing a CTRL-O (open project) and the Explorer dialog that you pick the PJX from does not populate with files and folders.

What can I say but ouch.
Just check set("path") before that. I don't know why it should matter, but just in case. It may contain a reference to an absent USB drive, or absent UNC path (hey, how can it be universal if only M$ calls it so?).