Since it is a possibility that LDFLAGS or CPPFLAGS were set with options that
in no way affect library or include directories the code must take that into
account and not assume some options were found.
diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index c8d9aa0..0f7b0b9 100644
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -270,8 +270,9 @@
                 parser.error = lambda msg: None
                 parser.add_option(arg_name, dest="dirs", action="append")
                 options = parser.parse_args(env_val.split())[0]
-                for directory in options.dirs:
-                    add_dir_to_list(dir_list, directory)
+                if options.dirs:
+                    for directory in options.dirs:
+                        add_dir_to_list(dir_list, directory)
 
         if os.path.normpath(sys.prefix) != '/usr':
             add_dir_to_list(self.compiler.library_dirs,