wow i don't know if i should even admit this but hell there might be someone else as stupid as me - after uninstalling/reinstalling gaim in kde, gnome, using both yum and up2date and editing the *.desktop preference files i started messing around with the panels thinking this
must be a KDE issue/preference. yep. all i had to do was remove the system tray, then add it back and voila - i had 7 instances of gaim running.
no better way to learn something than to fark it up then have to fix it
- disorderly