thanks guys, on the other wheels I did, everything went together fine. I'm not sure why this one was such a beyotch but I finally got it to go. I had to tighten them down a lot more than I wanted to or had to do in the past but ultimately none of them are that tight. wheel is all laced up and ready for completion.
Question, any reason to not go ahead and lace up my rear wheel now and then do the final adjustments on both wheels tomorrow? I'm thinking just in case I run into issues, I'd like to bring both wheels to someone to finish them up. I can't imagine there is an issue with just lacing up but I'll defer to you guys