I’M GUESSING meteorologists go to college for at least four years; some of them for six or eight, I’m sure. So why, with all their schooling and all their high-tech gizmos, are they accurate about half the time?

There are several, well-funded federal and international agencies sending up weather balloons as well as geostationary and polar satellites, and using Doppler and polarmetric radar to predict the weather, and still we get some genius on the evening news telling us “tomorrow will be mostly sunny, except if it rains or snows.”

My 80 year old mother-in-law is more reliable than all of them. She never had the opportunity to attend college, but when I want to know whether to wear my “2 Sexy 2 B 40” tank top, (okay, so it’s a few years old), or my raincoat to the pig races at the county fair, I call her.

The TV weather personality may predict mostly sunny skies, but if Bea says “red sky in mornin’, sailors take warnin’”, I’m wearing my high rubber boots.

The scientists study El Niño and La Niña patterns to predict long-range weather patterns and try to warn us about how much snow to expect in January. I’ve learned to pay little attention to their predictions, but if my mother-in-law tells me the squirrels have been loading up on extra acorns and beech nuts all November, I’m going to see my buddy, Barnie, to buy a 48 inch, 30 horsepower snow blower.

I don’t pay any attention to Punxsutawney Phil on Groundhog Day. Seems like every year he sees his shadow on that early February morning and we are told to expect six more weeks of winter.

First off, where I live, a winter that ends in late March is something to celebrate. I’ve seen my brother, KC, do cartwheels down Main Street wearing only his BVDs after news like that.

Secondly, of course Phil sees his shadow every Groundhog Day. He pops out of his hole and is immediately greeted with the flash of 200 cameras and five gazillion megawatts of TV camera lights. It could be midnight and he’d see his shadow.

My little woman’s mother is a virtual encyclopedia of rhyming weather predictions:

“When dew is on the grass, no rain will come to pass.”

“When leaves show their back, rain we won’t lack.”

“When the wind is from the south, rain is in its mouth.”

Still, my father-in-law, Floyd, hasn’t learned to rely on his wife for weather advice. Floyd has been farming for over 50 years. One late August morning he really wanted to cut a field of rowen before the weekend. Rain was predicted for the entire week to follow.

“Bea, I’m going to mow the Quimby field today,” he announced at the breakfast table.

“The cows are lying down,” she replied.

“So?” Bea hardly looked up from her bowl of shredded wheat. “It’s gonna storm today. You’ll never get that hay dry and it’ll rot in the field.”

Floyd bristled. He really wanted to cut that hay. “That pretty little girl, Sarah, on Channel 3 promised sun today and tomorrow,” he said.

“The cows are lyin’ down,” Bea repeated.

“They’re just tired, you silly old woman. Sarah’s a college trained meteorologist . . . and she’s some cute, too.”

“Suit yourself.”

Needless to say, Floyd no sooner knocked down 40 acres of a valuable second crop of hay when the skies opened. It was the kind of weather that inspired Noah to build that big boat.

The storm made mud so fast that my father-in-law soon had his Massey Ferguson stuck to the hubs of its five foot wheels. It took two other tractors and three hours in torrential rain to extract Floyd from the quagmire.

It was six o’clock that evening by the time Floyd, tail between his legs, dragged his sorry looking, water logged, manureenriched mud covered self into the farmhouse.

“What a day,” he lamented. “I’m tired, dirty, cold and starving. What’s for supper?”

Bea was less than sympathetic. “I don’t know Floyd. Why don’t you call that pretty little girl on Channel 3 and ask her? Maybe she’ll take you for a picnic on the beach . . . and don’t forget your sunscreen.”

My poor father-in-law didn’t get a beach picnic or a homecooked meal that night. In fact, he survived on humble pie for the following week or so.

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