I don't know which install number it was, but at some point I stopped getting the warning about install problems and the click through dialog. I finally found how to check the nvram from messages last year with Chris and used: 'efimanager -v' and it shows that Fedora is my first boot option.
So it seems that perhaps after some number of installations, the nvram does get updated. And once updated everything is kool.
Strangeness.