Keeping Austin Weird

After a short but action-packed vacay in TeAustxas, I'm back in business.  Hope the double-header from a fortnight ago and the many brilliant puzzles available at the sites listed in the sidebar tided you over.  I was excited to share some stories, but:
a) it's no longer fresh in my mind,
b) the whole trip was kind of a blur while it was happening anyway, and
c) it's 2:37am local time and I have work in the morning.

In lieu of stories proper, here are some miscellaneous highlights: Napalm Death (whose drummer ran offstage to barf, and came back to play the fastest song in the set), Between the Buried and Me, wearing sandals in the mosh pit like a boss, Deerhoof, lots of free beer, feeling oddly like a millionaire riding around downtown in pedicabs, Saul Williams, sticking a dollar bill on a girl's arm with a staplegun (that was her way of busking - Austin's a weird place), travelling across the continent to meet new friends that live in my home town, Deathfix, lots of tacos, and many more.

Today's puzzle went through a number of revisions and one complete rewrite.  Had the grid about half-filled on Sunday.  I jumped on the computer Monday morning to finish it up, but opted to tackle BEQ's themeless first, which I was shocked to discover contained one of the 11-letter entries I had used in one of my stacks.  It's been used before, but it's distinctive enough that I couldn't bring myself to use it only a day after BEQ, and since changing it would have necessitated a nearly complete rewrite, I shelved the puzzle and started anew (in case you hadn't noticed, I'm not dropping the entry in this write-up so that I can use the puzzle for a future post).  

Oh, and you'll see a name you may not recognize in the byline.  That's my buddy Drew, a fellow cruciverbal enthusiast and Cross Nerd solver, who helped with the cluing (and contributed 30-Down, probably the best clue in the puzzle).

More words, crossed and otherwise, next Tuesday.

Puzzle: Freestyle #22
Rating: XW-18A
Difficulty: Fairly torturous
Downloads:

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