“October, said the calendar. Before Halloween. And the 2.5
million trees occupying New York City’s open spaces confirmed it
was fall — not winter — with glorious canopies of leaves
stretching along their boughs,” as the New York Times reported
“Yet snow was falling. Not a light, mischievous form of frozen
precipitation, either, but heavy, wet flakes driven on the gusts
of an angry weather system barreling across the Northeast from
the Atlantic Ocean on Saturday, cracking sturdy limbs and
toppling power lines as it went. It also shattered records,
threatening some more than a century old, and elicited the kinds
of warnings from public officials that are not usually heard
until deep in winter. “As darkness fell, more than 1.8 million
customers from Pennsylvania reaching up into New England found
themselves without electricity as the region was lashed by
surprisingly high winds, snowdrifts and surging seas. On a
weekend that might normally have been spent raking leaves,
people were forced to react quickly — retr