Your question may evolve into another "Oak Leaf" in the compost pile type discussion.

No expert, just practical. I'm sure the pile is going to lose something, but covering it might prevent even more nutrient leaching or turning into muck with fall rains and winter snows. To my mind, it'll still be organic matter in the spring and have soil amendment or topdress value.

If it were my pile, believe me, I wouldn't let it go to waste under any circumstances. And I hope your recouperation is complete for the 2008 gardening season.

Ya do what you can. Covering it may help a bit. If you do get energetic before the hard freeze sets in, spreading in the fall is great but I wouldn't sweat it.

If it was good quality compost it will be stable and will not loose nutrients even if left uncovered because in good quality compost the only way nutrients are released is by bacterial activity, soil bacteria not the ones that digest the material we put in to be composted. A soil test of compost will seldom find any nutrients available because they are not water soluble.
Far too many people think of compost as the same thing as manure and it is not.

kimmsr, that's interesting and kind of what I thought. But I also thought that some of the "good stuff" would leach out of the compost with rainfall/moisture. Is that why spreading it in the fall, as tclynx suggests, is a good idea? Cause even though it's too cold for much bacterial activity, it's there for the soil when it warms up?

So does age of compost not matter at all? I did buy good compost. Will it retain full benefits indefinitely, just waiting for soil microorganisms to make use of it? Seems kind of hard to believe I could leave it sitting in a pile on asphalt for 3 years and it would still be as good . . .

Age of compost does matter in some ways. Many people try to use really young compost that has not cured or aged at all and it can hurt some types of sensative plants.

On the other hand, what you may notice if you leave that pile of compost sit there for 3 years is that there will seem to be less of it. Just because some one calls compost finished does not mean nothing is going on. Decomposition continues. Even if the compost was sterilized before being sold (which would be a shame but it sometimes happens) microbes are going to find their way back into it and continue digesting what they can. If left out from under cover some is likely to get washed away, blown away and compacted down. And in the spring don't be suprised if worms have found the bottom of your pile even on the asphalt.

Age of compost matters some since nothing in this world is perfect but waiting till spring because of whatever your situation is shouldn't make you loose sleep or anything. Do what you can, gardening is supposed to be fun.