[dcb]

FYI, played around with vb express and was able to echo the arduino serial output to the console without much fuss. would still need to parse it, but it is entirely doable (change COM4 to your com port):

Module Module1
    'based on http://support.microsoft.com/kb/904795/
    Sub Main()
        Using comport As IO.Ports.SerialPort = _
                My.Computer.Ports.OpenSerialPort("COM4")
            Do
                Dim Incoming As String = comport.ReadLine()
                If Incoming Is Nothing Then
                    Exit Do
                Else
                    Console.WriteLine(Incoming)
                End If
            Loop
            comport.Close()
        End Using

        Console.WriteLine("Press ENTER to quit")
        Console.ReadLine()
    End Sub

End Module