diff --git a/home/shrc b/home/shrc
index adafcd2..2a285f6 100644
--- a/home/shrc
+++ b/home/shrc
@@ -128,9 +128,6 @@ gdp() { ### @- invoke `gd` to diff a commit from its parent. the commit defaults
 
 alias ash="PS1='$ ' busybox ash"
 alias cort='LC_ALL=C sort'
-alias grop='grep -oP' ### @- invoke grep with `-oP`.
-### **NOTE:** there also exists a grop(1) program provided by
-### the *grop* package that i don't use.
 alias pip="maybesudo -H pip3"
 alias revend='objcopy -I binary -O binary --reverse-bytes=4' ### @- reverse the 4-byte endianness of a single file. *this is an in-place operation!*
 alias clone='maybesudo rsync -aHA --info=progress2 --no-i-r' ### @- invoke rsync suitably for creating virtually indistinguishable copies of files.
diff --git a/sh/grop b/sh/grop
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f73a44b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/sh/grop
@@ -0,0 +1,17 @@
+#!/usr/bin/env sh
+# YES_ZSH
+# YES_BASH
+# YES_DASH
+# YES_ASH
+
+# TODO: check for existence of grep -P; write a perl-based fallback.
+grop() { ### @- invoke grep with `-oP`.
+    ### **NOTE:** there also exists a grop(1) program provided by
+    ### the *grop* package that i don't use.
+    argc $# -ge 1 grop || return
+    grep -oP -- "$@"
+}
+
+[ -n "${preload+-}" ] || . ~/sh/preload || exit 2
+eval ${preload:-preload} argc
+[ -n "${preload+-}" ] || grop "$@"