Saturday's storm is shaping up to be a classic Maryland wintertime dance with the "rain/snow line."  The Clipper system is rolling across Chicagoland (above) and the upper Midwest along a narrow track that will drop snow across Pennsylvania and southern New England.

But the farther south you look, the wetter the precipitation gets. Snow north. Rain south. But that's where the forecasters out at Sterling begin to waffle.

"There will be a transition band in between," they note in this morning's discussion. "Have limited confidence on exactly where that will be."

For now, the forecast for York, Pa. calls for a snowy night tonight, a snowy morning tomorrow with some rain mixing in later in the day. They can expect 1 to 3 inches.

Westminster is looking at snow after midnight and early tomorrow. Sleet mixes in later contributing to an inch of stuff on the ground. Add rain, change it to snow in the evening.

Down in Salisbury, however, the storm is forecast to generate only rain, beginning on Saturday and  continuing with showers into the evening. A quarter-inch tops.

Baltimore, in the middle of all this, is slated for slop. Rain and sleet in the morning, then freezing rain, then rain after noon. "Little or no ice accumulation," they say. "Little or no snow accumulation."

Just a lousy, cold, wet day.

Uncertainty about where that rain/snow line falls, of course - or, for that matter, where the storm track finally goes - makes much of this a crapshoot. We'll just have to live through it and see.

What we do know is that there is colder air behind the storm. Look for highs in the 30s Sunday and Monday, with sunshine. Then another Clipper will  brush by us with snow showers on Tuesday, if the forecast holds up. Then there's more arctic air to be swept down behind the storm, with Wednesday topping out below freezing, but sunny. Yet another Clipper drops by on Thursday with snow showers, followed by even colder air behind that.

These Clippers make the winter more interesting, for sure. But they typically don't pack a lot of moisture, and consequently don't drop much snow, even if they run right over you. What snow-lovers need is a lot of cold air, followed by a nice coastal low, full of Gulf moisture.

Nothing like that on tap yet.