I just finished installing a new distributor cap and rotor. It made
things worse. now my car idles poorly. You can hear sputtering coming
from my tailpipe. It's a very erradic idle. up and down. It almost
sounds like it's going to stall at some points. I have no trouble
starting the car though.

I made sure the cooling system was bled properly. I let my car idle
for almost an hour. It took a long time for the fan to come on but it
did twice.

I did not see any arching when I looked at the wires while it was
running in the dark.

I tried checking the wires (which I did not yet replace) with an ohm
meter. I don't know what the problem is, but I cannot get any
continuity accross any of the wires. I put one lead in the spark plug
end, making sure I had contact with metal, and I put the other lead on
the distributor end touching metal, and nothing. The meter did
nothing. I even stuck a screwdriver into the sparkplug end to make
sure I was toughing the right park of metal.
I don't see how the car would be running if there was no continuity at
all, so i must be doing something wrong.

I guess I could try replacing the wires, but I hate to keep throwing
money at this and only making it worse.

Thanks for your help though. I appreciate all the information. and I
would appreciate anymore help you can provide me with.