Whither the weather?

Probably the most frequently consulted authority on weather here in the New Millennium is the Weather Channel. It has a plethora of data from a variety of sources which it gives to its personnel, all trained in the mystical arts of meteorology, and from all of these resources, it delivers, between the many commercials also seen here, forecasts, both immediate and long-range.

There is just one thing wrong with this rosy scenario: It requires a bit of intuition to put up an accurate forecast, and that is sometimes lacking. Take the storm that left us with around a foot of snow over the Christmas holiday. None of us ever doubted that the storm would hit. Its arrival was predicted, and the time it would come was set in stone. So people all over the U. S. were braced, but until the storm actually showed up, a lot of people didn’t know exactly what they were bracing for.

Take the track the storm would take when the low moved off the East Coast into the Atlantic. When the storm was still trying to wash California into the Pacific, the New England states were put on notice; a possible nor’easter was out there. But then, before the storm took aim at the mid-west, someone at the Weather Channel decided the storm would veer farther out to sea, so the predicted storm wouldn’t materialize in New England. And everyone breathed easier, until a day or so before Christmas, when the nor’easter was suddenly back on, and Monday saw a lot of the big Eastern Cities either digging out of a fairly sizable snow, or waiting their turn to do so.

Now you see the limitations of all that modern technology. So, what’s a body to do if an accurate forecast is needed? Well, there are the tried and true methods perfected-if that is the right word-by our ancestors.

One such source is Frank Crum. Frank, who is noted for his ability both as a preacher and as a columnist for the Express, is also schooled in reading signs that properly interpreted, will yield a long-range forecast. So, each year, around September, once the proper signs have been noted, Frank writes up his winter forecast in one of his columns. Unlike the Weather Channel, however, Frank will warn his readers that results may vary.

Then there is the Old Farmer’s Almanac. This publication has been offering up weather predictions a year at a time for well over 200 years. And it sometimes even gets some of them right. Take the forecast for the first part of December, delivered in the form of a verse: “Mild relief briefly-cold and snowy chiefly. Breath makes vapors as we yield ice scrapers.” Pretty much spot on, I’d say.

Which brings us to my favorite year-long forecasting method, the Ruling Days. The last six days of the old year and the first six days of the new year are each said to rule a particular month’s weather. The beauty of trying to make sense of this system is that by the time that month rolls around, you not only won’t remember what the ruling day for it forecast, you probably will have forgotten what a ruling day is.

The Weather Channel should have it so good.