The Farmer's Almanac has released its winter forecast. This is a different publication than the Old Farmer's Almanac, although technically, last year's Farmer's Almanac is an old Farmer's Almanac, as well.

Anyway, they say our winter will be "cold and snowy," which is as gutsy as predicting tomorrow will be characterized by "alternating periods of light and dark."

How do they know? They have a secret formula! Sunspots, the "tidal action of the Moon," and, my favorite, "the position of the planets."

Funny, I've never heard a hardware store guy say, "We're selling twice as many shovels and snowblowers, thanks to where Saturn's going to be sitting in a few weeks."

There are also "a variety of other factors," which probably consist of old folk-wisdom things like the thickness of a caterpillar's coat, the height of the dandelion stalks in June, the color of a possum's nose, and the first day Aunt Ginny feels a pang in her knuckles.

For 17 generations, Aunt Ginny's folks have been able to predict the snow depth in January within half an inch, based on whether her rhumee-tism started actin' up afore Labor Day or not. In 19-ought-seven, the reigning Aunt Ginny's corns were throbbing something awful, and two weeks later an Indonesian volcano erupted, sending hot ash that would've cooled the globe by six degrees for a year, except that was the year Neptune was over on the other side, so it all evened out.

Do predictions matter? We all know how we think it should go: wonderful snow the day before Thanksgiving for that over-the-river-and-through-the-woods vibe, a white Christmas. Then three months of pain, but it keeps the riffraff out. Neither riff nor raff can bear the cold.

What we get: Thanksgiving is brown and bare, the trees scratching at the scudding clouds with empty fingers. Maybe some snow in December, but not enough to instill confident festiveness. An irrational belief that if we don't start this whole snow thing soon, it's going to last into May, like a concert that starts two hours after the time stamped on the ticket.

We all know what happens next. Pitiless January.

It will be very cold, and then it will be perniciously cold, with bird-beak winds, the sun's rays reminding you of watered-down Tang. Then cometh the polar vortex. You walk outside, slip, hit the sidewalk, and shatter into chunks, which your panicked family members sweep up so they can fit them together, but the parts don't join well and there are too many missing pieces.

So they put them in the freezer next to the venison steaks Uncle Harvey gave you in 2018, because what's the alternative? Softening up the chunks on the stove, packing all the pieces in a snowmobile suit and hoping it all heals, somehow? C'mon, that never works.

Then comes February, a complete loser of a month. February is the guy the home office sends in to run the local branch for a while until they can get someone else in. And that would be March, which decides to make its mark with Second Winter.

I predict a short second winter. You read it here first, in the Grandson of a Farmer's Almanac.

james.lileks@startribune.com •