Ok; I had not intended to make my node a pruned node. Bummer. Now I've restarted the whole process and am currently syncing the blockchain. I have the space, but my network connection is painfully slow, so it will be a while. I'll post here again when I am able to try again.

I'm not sure why core wouldn't run, but I restarted the machine and now it will. But now I'm back to "progress increase %0.56 per hour" ... Be back in a week or so I figure...