Puzzle 65 - Themeless #50

No May 8 puzzle: Howdy, both the boys tested positive for COVID earlier this week. Everyone is healthy & recovered, and both my wife & I are vaccinated, but we are in the middle of two weeks of quarantining two preschoolers + working remote. Anyways, I don't have the time nor energy to clue (although the grid is rad) so just taking this time off. Be back on the 18th!

Please get your shot.

I'm delighted to bring you a puzzle that I streamed the construction of (well, 2/3 of the grid). It looks like Twitch only stores videos for a couple weeks, so the video is gone - but I had a great time & will try to do it again. Swing by my Twitch page next time (no idea when that will be, I'd love to do it like...once every couple months). And if you were hanging out w/ me in the stream, fear not, for I have rebuilt the NW, and the SE was left blank, so you'll get like 1/2 of of an unspoiled puzzle.

I did not ACPT - tough on everyone to not be parenting for a whole weekend - but I hope everyone had a great time! One of these years Morgan and I are gonna do a NYC/DC vacation around an in-person tournament - spend a week or so exploring one of the cities and get to meet puzzle folks in person. Anyways, big congrats to Tyler Hinman, who streams a couple times a week on Twitch as well - check it out & be awed.

Speaking of the puzzle, I think this one will be fairly tough - it's a little proper-heavy. Everything's fairly crossed and all that jazz, and there's plenty of non-proper fun. I also recommend either the PDF or the PuzzleMe applet on this one - bonus points if you print out the PDF & solve in the tiny grid as well :)

PUZ

PDF

Solution