Hi Miles, and welcome to the forum.

Just a thought---you don't have to drain the pool just because your stabilizer is high--you can always just up your baseline chlorine levels to compensate for it...take a look at the "best guess chlorine chart" link in my sig for more details on that. However, if you choose to drain your pool, be aware that if you're not careful you can actually float the pool out of the ground!! Hopefully Ben or one of the others will be by soon to address the rest of your questions, but I just don't want you making any hasty decisions that you'll regret, when draining is NOT your only option!