While sitting here planning for my future setup and activities I have come to the conclusion that I may take a bit of a different route once arriving home.

Have been looking at the possibility of a 60 foot free standing tower, either two beams for 10-20 (10/15/20 and 12/17) or one beam that does all of the listed bands. As well as one vertical and an array of wires is always needed (those I already have). VHF/UHF is of little importance to me other than for rare chit chat locally so those can stay on the roof mount.

I have also been reading up on diversity receive but that is another story. Which leads me to my change. Before I was about 99% ragchew, however I am thinking of chasing some paper or at least contesting 50% of the time. Figured I would start small with some weekend contesting as well as working on a general WAS. When looking into WAS I see there are endorsements such as QRP and single band. If I understand correctly I think you can mix endorsements. Example: Single band QRP WAS. Correct me if I am wrong.

Anyway, when looking at the ARRL site I have come to the conclusion that I will have a lot of reading to do. Not only are there a lot of general rules but there are a lot of contest specific rules as well. Not to mention the application process. Bleh, talk about dumbfounded. Which brings me to my point, any suggested reading? Like, contesting rules and regulations for dummies? :P Seriously, I assume that it is not all that bad when taken one step at a time but trying to take in everything I could in one day made me look and say "huh".

Example: I was looking at WAC and DXCC. From the wording of one or the other (I dont remember which) I have come to the conclusion that you need to work your stations on a mix of 5 bands. However, I am unsure if this is for DXCC in general if if there is a 5 band DXCC. Also, what I can not figure out is, do you need to work each entity one time on each band or does it just mean that you are limited to those five bands and must work the entity in one of said bands one time?

For the WAC, I realize that you have to work each continent and I do believe that you have to do so one time on each band. I could be getting that incorrect though.

As I said, any suggested reading? I need something to read to kill spare time anyway. I have probably 5-6 months before getting home and another 3 months or so before I will be setup to bother with contesting at all.