I got the heads back from the machine shop Friday. They cut 0.005" off both faces (intake and cylinder contact surface areas) to keep things aligned and the manifold at the correct ride height. I glued the intake and header gaskets to the head utilizing weatherstrip adhesive. There's where they stayed overnight, with a 100 lb bucket of pipe fittings on top of them to keep the gaskets compressed and glued tight.
I test fit the manifold and the intake surfaces matched up perfectly. The intake studs all went down fine.
Here's where I'm quitting today... The head studs went down fine, antisieze for the block threads and ARP moly for the top. I test fit the Ersons to ensure I didn't have any head stud interference issues, all were fine. The studs nuts clicked right down to 85 lb ft (3 incremental torques) with no sign of thread fatigue. The intake studs torqued fine to 35 lb ft also.
There's a ton more left to do. All's well thus far though...