Holy crap MD, you got the gamut covered I think. A buddy of mine has one of the Log Periodic's at his place. He's big into MARS and works with the State EmComm regularly. He sings that antenna's praises. Polyphazers are the shit for lightning protection. I don't don't keep my radio's hooked up, but will get the poly's when I go that route. I also run a LDG tuner, the Z-100 IIRC. The only HF rig I have is a IC-706 icom. It works well mobile and is a decent home set up. The 857 is what I have my eye on for down the road. I don't have a tower so i'm more limited as to what I can get up and operational.
Thanks for the update. Nice station you have.