Skin lost and player model switched to Alex

Just updated from 15w50a and now my account skin is gone and I appear as Alex in-game to my client (via F5 third person, etc.). Skin was fine on 15w50a. Was not able to verify skin/model change to other players on server (server also updated to 15w51b just now).

Logged into minecraft.net and uploaded a new (Steve based) skin - was successful but even after exiting MC and restarting, the skin and player model did not take affect.

I'm stuck as Alex. ¯_(ツ)_/¯