I'm prepping the Pants 1.24.0.dev3 release presently. PR should be up shortly and I hope to get that in and cut the release later tonight. Speak up if you need accommodations.

not directly related, but is there any way i can pitch in on the issue blocking the pex 2.0.3 upgrade, or was that already figured out?

Its already figured out - thanks. I just need to put in a bit more time. There were actually a swath of issues lurking and the generation of pants pex was but one.