Was that a raindrop just then?

This has happened so many times over the course of our marriage that I guess it must be true. With the exception of just one meteorologist in the world - and that person happens to know who he or she is, so need to embarrass anyone else - I simply cannot follow a weather cast on the TV news and wind up with enough intelligent input that I can a) tell you what the weather is going to be like in the period ranging from the next 10 minutes to the next 7 days or b) tell myself whether I need a jacket, hat, umbrella or monsoon gear to go outside.

My problem - and please feel free to write this down in case you are in charge of this sort of thing, is that the weather casters - with that one exception - will fill their allotted time with minutiae about the low pressure system developing over Sheboygan, and the dew point this morning in Brattleboro, and then when they start in on clothing advice ("better plan to wear a jacket or a parka on Tuesday of next week; it's supposed to be like 9° that afternoon") I just crazy go nuts. And start figuring out which jacket I ought to wear, and where it is, and did I get my gloves out of the truck after last winter yet, and ... The best weather caster comes on and patiently tells me that the same rain they've been having in Chicago and Pittsburgh will be here later today, that it will be sunny until then, and then by the time I leave work this afternoon, it should be pouring down. Simple. I don't know from frontal boundaries and wind shear system, and Trailing Ridge sounds like a development up in Cecil County to me.

So the result, all too often, is that after the weather is over, I turn to Peggy and ask what the weather is going to be. Or I strut outside, spectacularly unprepared for the weather that everyone else in town but I knew about.

So here are my choices: either I move to the Midwest, you know, like Kansas, or get real rich and hire my own meteorologist to call me every morning with a clear, concise, even-a-dummy-can-understand-it forecast.

Neither seems likely. Say, do you think I'll need a jacket today?