Winter’s coming to the Northern Hemisphere. John Erben, Scott Gaffney, Lisa Shatford and Jack Shaw reflect on the anticipation of fall from Alaska to the Alps.

Just as a dog acts strangely before an earthquake, you seem a little off to those around you. How can you be so glib that summer is ending? Why are you wearing your puffy jacket and ski boots by the pool? Haven’t you watched that TGR movie six times this week?

Your semi-obsessive behavior portends trouble ahead. Like Richard Dreyfuss in Close Encounters of the Third Kind, you are driven by a force others can’t comprehend. You, too, make mashed-potato mountains, but not because aliens are coming. You do it so your fork can take the gnarliest runs down their russet chutes…

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