By RON GOWER

rgower@tnonline.comWinter won't officially arrive for another three months, but some prognosticators have it all figured out.From the superstitious goose-bone man to the heavily referenced Farmer's Almanac, all predictions are that this is going to be a terrible winter.We're going to have lots of snow and bitter cold temperatures. It will be worse than last year.You think heating bills were bad last year? You'll need a Brink's truck this year to take you to your fuel oil company to make payment. Or maybe just a sled and a team of dogs.Of course, newspaper people are skeptics by nature. So we decided to create our own prediction.We'll first turn to the liberals and their global warming concerns.Since carbon dioxide emissions are eroding the ozone layer, the earth is having a warm-up. That's been punctuated by the hot summers we've been having (well, maybe not this year) and the melting of the glaciers.Of course, last winter was colder than normal. But global warming is still occurring, scientists say.It's the polar vortex that caused all that cold weather.Depending on which scientific accounts you read, global warming could create a warmer-than-normal winter, or the polar vortex will again affect our weather.How can we prepare with such inconsistent predictions? Do we need a parka or a jacket?AccuWeather's Paul Pastulek, whose specialty is long-range forecasting, said, "December could get kind of wild due to the very active southern jet stream that is going to provide the moisture for bigger snowstorms. The Northeast could have a couple of big storms in December and early January."I decided to dig deeper. The reliable woolly bear caterpillar will tell me.Unfortunately, the woolly bear caterpillar won't come out until later in the fall, and I honestly can't tell if his coat is thicker than normal.The goose-bone man can tell by looking at, well, goose bones.We thought about this, but how can we tell if the goose we are eating came from a farm in Lancaster, Georgia or Canada?We were told of another "sure" way to predict winter. The date of the first snow fall tells us how many snow coverings we'll get during the year. In other words, if we get snow on Nov. 23, expect 23 more coatings.Forget all the gobbledygook above. I think I have the answer to predicting our winter.Fellow journalist Ed Hedes has a crystal ball he uses to predict football games. I'm not sure how accurate it is, but let's give it a try.As we shake it, we ask the question:"What's the weather forecast for winter?"We don't need a crystal ball.Winter is three months long. Weather will be variable.The long-range forecasts are interesting to hear. But don't take them as gospel.The National Weather Service said on one of its Facebook pages, "The outlook from the weather service's Climate Prediction Center shows an equal chance of above-average, normal or below-average snowfall from December through February 2015."Not much of a prediction, is it?