I looked up the microchip spec and answered some of my own questions (should have done that a while ago) 
I placed a 3.9K ohm resistor between the +5 rail and the SDA and another one between the +5 rail and SCL. The circuit still works! That's a good sign. I'll now monitor for a few days and see if it freezes again.
Do you think the best place for this is at the Arduino? Or do you think the end of the wire is better? I'll solder them in if this works for me.
If it works for a few days, do you think I could depend on it long term? Or is this always going to be an "Iffy" connection because of the long wires? I don't care if I have to clear the LCD every once and a while because of bad data, but I can't have the thing locking up.
Thank you for all your help!!!! You guys are awesome 
Whiskey