It's nice to hear this kind of arguments.

There are a few rules that I use for temporary variables tables.

If sql has exception statements and not writing big tables to...

DECLARE @dummy TABLE (tid INT, VARCHAR(20))

SELECT * FROM @dummy

is this help

You can use table as variable in SQL2000. We are using it for memory based tables.

Just search on google.

Have you think of using table variable like

declare @temptable table( name varchar(20), id int)

insert into @temptable

select name, id

from tables

select * from @table

This is all memory based and table...

I think we need more information to answer your question properly but try this.

select ReceiptDate,

(select B.instock

from B.stock B

where B.ProductID in (select distinct C.ProductID

...