To everyone who suggested a bad coil:
win.
New MSD coil was procured and installed. With much trepidation I warmed it up and took it on the road. On the big highway I shifter into second gear, brought it to 4000 RPM and stomped it. Holy crap! It was a rocket to 6000 RPM where I let off the gas. I did a couple more runs with the same results through the gears. Awesome. It will need minor tuning, I'm sure, but the thing is super quick.
Someone once said that the problem with being a pessimist is that you can never celebrate when you're right. I dont think he mentioned how much sweeter the crow can taste when you're wrong, though.
Thanks to everyone for the help. I picked up some knowledge and fixed my problem, so I hope others have honed their troubleshooting and gotten smarter on something. Also, my mood is much improved from the last few days.
Congrats! I'm glad you got it running right. Your symptoms showed classic signs of ignition breakdown. The reason richening the afr improved things was likely 2fold. 1, it probably needed some of that, and 2, more fuel lowers the impedance inside the cylinder.....easier for the spark to jump the gap.
I learned a bit reading this thread and I hope you'll follow up with your tune settings once you get it dialed in.