Thanks to the Third Floor’s recent nuptials, blogging has been less-than-sporadic around here the past few weeks. Please forgive; today we’re starting again in earnest.

Baton Pass: Marin Alsop’s appointment as the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra’s new music director (starting in ’07), and the surrounding brouhaha, may be old news, but it’s still worth taking a look at some of the out-of-town press. Well, first, check out the Sun’s BSO conductor search mini-page, which contains all the local daily’s reportage. Then visit New York Times music critic Anthony Tommasini’s smart piece on musician/conductor relationships. For a more standard take, it doesn’t get much more straightforward than Lev Grossman’s Time magazine story.

Left Coast: Former Sun editor in chief John Carroll’s recent departure from his post at the LA Times was mentioned only briefly locally. For a more thorough look at what’s going on, you couldn’t do better than LA Weekly columnist Nikki Finke’s Deadline Hollywood report.

Reason to Be Crabby: D.C. beats Baltimore with this great Washington City Paper shouldn’t-we-have-done-this-story about the origins of Phillips Foods’ crabs. Hint: It ain’t the bay.