Ice, ice, baby

Winter. Omaha. (sigh)

Well, at least it's pretty. Present temperature: 0º. Wind chill: -13º.

No shelter at all

This was the view Friday of the homeless camp just off Omaha's Keystone Trail.

Sometimes, a crude shelter is no shelter at all -- no good against the cold and worthless in the snow. It looks like whoever was camped here is long gone . . . thankfully.

THE HIGH on Friday was 13. That was a big improvement over Thursday, which started out at 10 below.

If this is all the shelter you have, there's a word to describe you. That would be "dead."

Still, consider there are folks out there . . . in the cold. In rough camps not much better than this. It's what they call "home."

Ours is a society of cracks, through which "the least of these" fall, much like the snow through the gaps in this lean-to.

Lord, have mercy.

Frozen in time

When it's this cold, "frozen in time" isn't just 

another expression. Just so you know.