> 2) why does this [still] work for Jack? (Jack, what's M-x org-version for > you?)
I tested on my laptop and desktop, both work for me, they are running the following 2 versions of org: Org mode version 9.2.4 (9.2.4-13-g9a543b-elpaplus @ /home/jack/.emacs.d/elpa/org-plus-contrib-20190729/) Org mode version 9.2.6 (9.2.6-4-ge30905-elpaplus @ /home/jack/.emacs.d/elpa/org-plus-contrib-20190930/)