I can answer your third question for you. Any files started prior to E15 will give the Azurill egg for sure. You can go back to E12 and do TM breeding, but you have to be careful not to load from somewhere that didn't exist as of E12 (nothing further than Route 2/Celestinine Cascade) and have the last place you saved be somewhere that was the same back then. I think that the Candy Store meets these requirements, and it's very close to the Daycare too.
Cain's earring wasn't on a rock nor was it in a Pokeball. When you start to explore Azurine Island, there's a small pool of water with something glinting on it. That's his earring.
Meowstic M learns Reflect at Level 35, so you don't need to worry about that.
EDIT: You can catch Numel and Pansear in Peridot when it's raining. For your future Arcanine, if you've saved all the police officers, you can get Growlithe from the Police Station. I'd use Muk over Swalot as it has better stats and movepool. You can find Grimer in the Wasteland or by fishing in the Shitbrown Lake. You can train new Pokémon up against the Grand Hall Trainers.
With my Fighting-types, I targeted Jynx first because it was the only threat to my team. Lure with Toxicroak, switch to Scrafty, Heracross knocks out Jynx. After that, he fell victim to Drain Punches, High Jump Kicks and Close Combats.
@the badge race: The only way that Fern beating Radomus while being weaker than you makes sense is if the Gym Leaders adjust their teams according to the levels of their challengers.
@level caps: I imagine that the Gym Leaders would be able to bypass the level caps by virtue of being Gym Leaders. Since the Meteors probably wouldn't all have the time to go around and challenge the Gym Leaders, I think that T3RR4 would just have given them all her badge and let them bypass the level caps because she's bored.
You need the Crystal Plugs to get Solosis and the Yureyu Key.
To confirm Dark's statement, Common Candies do reduce a Pokemon's happiness.
Ame did get a redesign in E15.
That's not a Pokemon that's going to be particularly helpful for a Ground-type Gym. I don't think that the event's weather specific either, and Pokesnax don't matter.