adding tun module to debian kernel

this is going to be a mess, i can feel it now. the kernel i'm using is linux-image-2.6.29-xs5.5.0.14. i'm going to get sources for linux-source-2.6.29-xs5.5.0.17 and compile it with the tun module. 
# apt-get install fakeroot build-essential devscripts
# apt-get install linux-libc-dev binutils bzip2 cpp cpp-4.3 gcc gcc-4.3 libc6-dev libgmp3c2 libgomp1 libmpfr1ldbl libncurses5-dev kernel-package
i just copy and pasted that second line from some forum i saw... i don't know why, but it seems legit? i also installed backports. i thought i was going to get an old kernel source from there, but they ended up not having it. 
deb http://www.backports.org/debian/ lenny-backports main
# wget -O - http://backports.org/debian/archive.key | apt-key add -
# apt-get update
so instead of backports, i'm going to attempt to use the kernel config for 2.6.29-xs5.5.0.14 on 2.6.32. 
# apt-get install linux-source-2.6
# cd /usr/src; tar xjf linux-source-2.6.32.tar.bz2
# ln -s linux-source-2.6.32 linux
# cd linux
# cp /boot/config-2.6.29-xs5.5.0.14 .config
now to configure shit 
# make oldconfig
i just basically answered all the default choices it gave me 
# make menuconfig
Include "Networking support > Networking options > Network packet filtering framework (Netfilter)" and follow it to enable IPTables. Include "Device Drivers > Network device support > Universal TUN/TAP device Edriver support" now build. setting CONCURRENCY_LEVEL to the number of CPUs available will help keep the machine sane, I guess. 
# export CONCURRENCY_LEVEL="1"
# time make-kpkg --initrd --append-to-version=-custom kernel_image
now wait. after 11 minutes and 27.498 seconds: 
# cd /usr/src
# dpkg -i linux-image-2.6.32-custom-xs5.5.0.14_2.6.32-custom-xs5.5.0.14-10.00.Custom_i386.deb
# reboot
lo and behold, the machine came up, and openvpn worked.