Cherry-pick a few commits from tume/only_py3

[sylvinus]

These 2 seem interesting:
tume@97e2a53
tume@ed40f77

Thanks @tume!

[AlJohri]

just wanted to check in on py3 status. what issues remain?

[AlJohri]

hey @sylvinus, just bumping this issue again. I'm still interested in mrq when it supports python 3. is there a master issue with what's left? maybe a list of tests that fail?

thanks!

[sylvinus]

Hi @AlJohri !

Actually that's it, we support python3 :) You can test our latest release 0.2.1 and let us know how it performs for you!

(This issue is about commits unrelated to python3 support)

[AlJohri]

Omg awesome. Will try now