Solution: ALMS
Slam: anagram fodder
dancing: anagram indicator
charity: definition
New puzzle and clue on Thursday!
@joshuakosman.bsky.social
Retired classical music critic for the San Francisco Chronicle. Co-constructor, Out of Left Field cryptic crossword. pacificaisle.substack.com. He/him
Solution: ALMS
Slam: anagram fodder
dancing: anagram indicator
charity: definition
New puzzle and clue on Thursday!
OK folks. I make a monthly donation to support the San Francisco food bank. Right now they have a matching program, meaning every $1 turns into $2. Would you join me? Let's raise $1200.
23.10.2025 03:28 โ ๐ 107 ๐ 74 ๐ฌ 3 ๐ 13"In tackling Wagnerโs final and most enigmatic operatic creation, the company has deftly bypassed all the pieceโs most intractable challenges and opted instead to dazzle the eyes and ears."
I'm back in the Chronicle today, with a review of SF Opera's radiant new Parsifal.
Fantastic essay by Rebecca Bryant Novak @notorious-rbn.bsky.social about the craptacular ineptitude of classical music organizations in general, and the Baltimore Symphony in particular, on matters of harassment and workplace sexual abuse.
rebeccabryantnovak.substack.com/p/classical-...
Happens to the best of us :)
26.10.2025 14:25 โ ๐ 0 ๐ 0 ๐ฌ 0 ๐ 0Took a minute to realize you meant Ben Bradlee ๐
26.10.2025 05:28 โ ๐ 0 ๐ 0 ๐ฌ 1 ๐ 0It is far past time to stop tip-toeing around people's feelings and start being upfront with members of the gerontocracy. Sometimes it is just time to take away the keys.
www.thedailybeast.com/police-repor...
its remarkable to see random suburbanites in their fucking PJs have more courage than the vast majority of america's political, social, and civil elites
25.10.2025 17:41 โ ๐ 7582 ๐ 2003 ๐ฌ 27 ๐ 111RWers will NOT stop beating the drum trying to make "trans" radioactive.
They must be resisted steadfastly, until the polarity finally switches and it becomes a toxic subject for them to invoke.
Trans rights are human rights, end of story.
Itโs terrifyingly good
25.10.2025 05:37 โ ๐ 1 ๐ 0 ๐ฌ 0 ๐ 0Personally I think a really good reason for you to stop going to Thanksgiving with any MAGA relatives you may have is because you really cannot trust them not to sexually abuse your children
23.10.2025 21:43 โ ๐ 1073 ๐ 208 ๐ฌ 31 ๐ 14๐ถ Cinqueโฆ
Ottoโฆ
Trediciโฆ
Ventunoโฆ
Trentaquattroโฆ
Cinquantacinqueโฆ ๐ต
(Le Nozze di Fibonacci)
I canvassed all the performances I could find on Sp*tify to see who, if anyone, nailed this correctly.
Answer: Gerald Finley, Evelyn Lear, and Mary Ann Hart, a mezzo-soprano unknown to me.
Everyone else, including some big names, gets the pronunciation wrong.
This matters if you're a singer performing Charles Ives' setting of the poem. You kind of want to get the words right.
24.10.2025 17:27 โ ๐ 5 ๐ 0 ๐ฌ 1 ๐ 0You can tell from the rhyme (because Longfellow's rhymes are never subtle or interesting) what the night is beginning to do.
It's not beginning to lower (rhymes with goer) i.e., descend.
It's beginning to lower (rhymes with hour), i.e., per Merriam-Webster, "become dark, gloomy, and threatening."
How about a bit of poetry/music pedantry to finish out the week?
Here's the first stanza of Longfellow's treacly poem "The Children's Hour":
Between the dark and the daylight,
When the night is beginning to lower,
Comes a pause in the day's occupations,
That is known as the Children's Hour.
A sweaty ICE agent looking into the camera as a woman next to him gleefully flips him off with both hands.
Yesterday on Canal St. in Chinatown.
(Photo by the superb www.instagram.com/nigrotime?ig...)
Slam dancing for charity (4)
In our latest Out of Left Field cryptic crossword, sent to subscribers this morning, @hpicciotto.bsky.social and I explore new philanthropic possibilities.
www.patreon.com/posts/puzzle...
New post at On a Pacific Aisle, with thoughts on Samuel Adams, SF Music Day, Philharmonia Orchestra, and more.
pacificaisle.substack.com/p/sam-he-is
New post at On a Pacific Aisle, with thoughts on Samuel Adams, SF Music Day, Philharmonia Orchestra, and more.
pacificaisle.substack.com/p/sam-he-is
Bret Stephens Why Mamdani Frightens Jews Like Me
because i'm a dumb little baby who has no grip on reality
22.10.2025 12:58 โ ๐ 4345 ๐ 358 ๐ฌ 155 ๐ 68Solution: DEMOCRATIC
Arcane: anagram indicator
comedic art: anagram fodder
going blue: definition
New puzzle and clue on Thursday!
Thank you, this is splendid! Stealing for a cryptic crossword.
20.10.2025 14:26 โ ๐ 1 ๐ 0 ๐ฌ 0 ๐ 0Nice! Two things though:
1) That was NOT an extremely easy puzzle. On the easier side of median maybe, but, like, 3 or 4 out of 10?
2) An hour and 10 minutes for your first complete solo solve is terrifically impressive! Absolutely no self-deprecation called for.
Keep it up!
NYT has reached the Fox News Event Horizon where you are less informed if you consume what they put out than if you don't.
19.10.2025 17:07 โ ๐ 85 ๐ 11 ๐ฌ 0 ๐ 0Which one? Where? Whose?
Also: congratulations!
I remember during the Tylenol murders in 1982 hearing a news report that law enforcement had decided it was not part of some kind of corporate sabotage aimed at Johnson & Johnson but rather was the work of โa madmanโ
19.10.2025 23:14 โ ๐ 0 ๐ 0 ๐ฌ 0 ๐ 0One of my all-time best (and most fervent) rants
pacificaisle.blogspot.com/2008/01/see-...