"Trying to Connect" problems? ... Watch Suddenly Working Poorly?

on your watch (like on the phone) the app "Google Play Services" invisibly updates. my watch used to Connect and run great with Google Play Services 8.6.98 on the watch ... but after it invisibly updated to 9.0.83 my watch runs poorly since it's connection to phone is now laggy and buggy, because 9.0.83 SUCKS compared to the 8.6.98 it came with stock in the MM image... it used to just connect, now it says "Trying to Connect" for long times on the phone wear app and I get "Android Wear Not Responding" crashes.

I can't see a fix other than to hope Google updates this buggy version soon.

I'm on:
Samsung Galaxy Note 3 with Jedi Rom KitKat 4.4.2
Rooted Huawei Watch with 1.4 MM MEC23L image from Google Android Wear 2.0 dev preview downloads section

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