Dick? Really? Calling you out on calling yourself a ccie when clearly everyone knows that is not even close to true is not being a dick... That is just calling someone out on their BS!

So what was the problem, only tcp for the rule? Wrong source?
Maybe you had policy route on the rule? But that wouldn't of stopped ping to pfsense IP? Only ping to other lan.. That is another common mistake.

I gave the bridge mode a try today. I believe I have the PFSense appliance properly configured.

I was able to update firmware and download Snort but I think I had a conflict of some kind so I decided to abort for now. Everything went south on me so I stopped and backed out.

It turns out I accidentally took down my whole network by accidentally plugging my Lan into the third expansion Wan port on the Balance 210 Router that is not activated. Stupid move! It took me an hour to realize the bone head move!

Needless to say ...that port is now tapped over.

Will read some more and go at it again in a few days ....