Thanks. Regarding UDP, that all makes sense. For my short-term needs, to minimize risk and infrastructure changes, it looks like the ASYNC module will work. Here's the basic outline of what I'm doing: -------- async_workers=8 route { route(CHECK_IS_EXPENSIVE_OPERATION); if ($var(isExpensiveOperation)) { async_task_route("COMMON"); } else { route(COMMON); } } route[COMMON] { # Do all my normal routing logic. } -------- I detect at the very top of the main route whether the operation will be expensive. If so, I process the message with an async worker. If not, I directly process the message on the TCP worker. The rest of the routing logic remains unchanged. The only difference is that I execute the expensive operations using the async workers. It's not the prettiest thing in the world, but it seems like an OK short-term fix to relieve pressure. I will revisit the bigger architectural ideas in a later phase. Thanks again for all your help and good ideas. Happy Friday. -Cody