SWEET... I was able to get it to work. I wonder if I didn't include the AdvancedLauncher in my updates, but I don't see how that would have mattered (already thought I had it installed)
I didn't wipe (just nandroid to be safe), installed 1.8, advanced launcer (to be safe), and everything worked, and I didn't get 100000x FC errors.
Now that this works, I wonder if pushing any MetaMorph will work. I'll have to test that out later tonight.
Thanks for you hard work and I'm glad it worked on my G1 again.