Once again the city of Knoxville, and the Jamison Inn, opened their doors to our chapter meeting. And once again, the meeting was hosted by Ron Bruce and his now infamous Knoxville Gang: Art(acmcRae) McRae and Tom (stonecutter) Broyles. Good Irish names all...

The gates to the Team Room were opened early on Friday and didn't close until mid-afternoon on Sunday. This, of course, appealed to the more mild-mannered members of this chapter. As everyone knows, most members of Chapter XXXIII are not prone to partake of hard spirits (except Bobby Burke who just can't seem to help himself is Anne isn't around to chaperone him).

Ron Bruce introduced our guest speaker, Tim Burke, a Marine, who had spent three tours in Afghanistan. He presented us with an up-to-date synopsis of the life and times of our troops and the Afghan Military. Naturally, Bobby had to append his assertion to Ron's introduction that Tim was a long lost cousin of his. When quarried about this fact, Tim smiled politely (the way marines do) and murmured "No comment."

There was no formal dinner arraignments so everyone split to the four winds to do their thing. The Auction was scheduled for 1930 hours and was conducted by none other than Honest Harry Matthews and that infamous Irishman from the Knoxville Gang, Art McRae. At the end of the night, they had auctioned off everything in sight and brought in about $650 to our coffers.

And so, as all good things must do, our Summer Chapter Meeting has drawn to a close. The troops and their brides (better halves at least) depart to places unknown and await that next call to arms in October. I have snapped a few photos of this meeting and you can view them at your leisure. Hope you enjoyed your stay at Knoxville this last weekend and hope to see you in Cleveland, Tennessee come 17 October 2007 for our Fall meeting.