The June 13 AM TCG meeting was hosted by W4PA and his gracious 
wife Mary, at the beautiful Gatlinburg chalet of K4FW. 

The day began with learning how to correctly attach a PL-259
connector the right way.  K1KY demonstrated the finer points
of PL-259 soldering technique.  I thought I knew how to do this 
right, until Tom showed us his highly developed technique.  A
true master.  Thanks for the very valuable tutorial!

Attending the June 13 AM meeting were KE4OAR, KF4EQS, K1KY, W4KH, 
N4AFG, AC4LS, W4PA, and K4RO.

The meeting began with a showing of the W4CAT multiop station video.  
The "CatHouse" undergoes continuous refinement under the exacting eye 
of K1KY.  Ask Tom to explain the CatBar to you (now visible on the TCG 
WWW page picture gallery.)

In our continuing mission to make more TCG meetings more accessible
statewide, W4PA "volunteered" to act as the East TN Facilitator.
It takes two people to make a meeting.  Hook up with Scott and/or
other East TN contesters.  Have lunch or something.  Talk contesting.
Tell us about it.  You just had a TCG meeting.  We'll use the reflector 
to maintain ongoing dialog about the latest and ongoing TCG happenings.

There has been a lot of discussion among the USA contesting community 
lately regarding the 175-mile radius definition for  ARRL "medium" club 
competition.  W4PA proposed an alternative "Medium Category" definition 
as follows, which we all agreed offered the best compromise:

	"Any club member station is eligible to participate in the
	 ARRL Medium Category if the station is within a 175 mile 
	 radius of the club centroid -OR- is within the same ARRL 
	 section as the club's centroid."

The next step is to present this proposal to the contesting community
and to the ARRL.  Who will take the lead on behalf of TCG for this step?

The group agreed to adopt the Contesting Ethics guidelines proposed
by W9WI.  Doug is working on a few editorial changes.  The guidelines 
will be posted on the TCG page for all to consider when complete.
TCG strongly disapproves of any form of cheating, and takes pride in 
our members honoring all of the contest rules completely.

The rest of the meeting was spent working on the growing W4PA antenna
farm.   W4KH and K1KY performed heroic feats atop a telephone pole
and the big bertha pole, battling homeless wasps, venomous stings, 
tree branches, and potassium depletion.  The Dynamic Duo wrestled 
an A-3 from at least a dozen tree branches, replaced feedlines on a 
3 el 40m yagi and a TH-7, and basically got W4PA in Real Good Shape
for the '98-'99 contest season.  As Scott aptly noted, this has to be
the only sport where competitors work *so hard* to improve their 
competitor's chances of winning!  A big TCG salute is in order to 
Tom and Jack for significant contributions to Scott's upcoming scores!

The evening concluded with another TCG meeting, held downtown in G-burg.
In attendance were: were K1KY, W4KH, N4AFG, AC4LS, K4RO, W4PA and Mary.
The topics of our evening meeting focused on more esoteric arrays.  
Of particular interest were the 8 element 5 oz array (phased in a three 
stack) and the 3 element 16 inch array (with wide beamwidth.)  We all 
concluded that K1KY has most definitely earned his AAGG title, and that 
cruisin' Gatlinburg on a Saturday night is Totally Happening.  Special
thanks to W4KH for climbing towers all day, then driving us around all 
night, sober and safely.

Extra special thanks to Mary for tolerating us turning the kitchen
into a PL-259 soldering station, and putting up with our radio madness 
while she worked all weekend long.