This is the view from downtown Stevens Point, Wisconsin this afternoon -- short blasts of ice and snow slowly building up into howling crescendos of pure artic fury.  I saw the wind change from kindly "snake" patterns of drifting snow to full bodied blasts that slap your face no matter what direction you try to walk into to avoid the wind.  Even with my face mostly covered, I could've done better with some goggles to shield my eyes. 

I feel like the snow just ate right through me and what I really want to do is take a long bath and drink hot cocoa.  My only problem is that I have a toothache -- the gums around my wisdom tooth on my right side seems to have gotten infected somehow.  All night long I heard the wind howl and my tooth hurt with that itchy kind of pain that often accompanies a gum infection.  I can't afford to go to a dentist, so I've been administering Anbesol to numb the pain.  It's not a throbbing pain, just an inflamed, itchy kind of pain that distracts me from eating and drinking anything warm.

Of course it would be just my luck to have tooth pain right during a snow storm!

And for those of you following this blog, I did finally get some toilet paper, but couldn't buy it Tuesday night because the nearest store was out of the four packs of TP.  So first I grabbed as much as I could from the public restroom, then I realized I could just use a box of tissue for the time being, and waited til Wednesday.  Wednesday seemed to be the best time for everyone in town to stock up on, not just toilet paper, but on everything else under the sun in preparation for the big storm.  Since I didn't have enough dollars to spend on some mega 24 pack of toilet paper, I made a stock boy run into the back room to grab me just a simple, single person, enough to wipe one ass for one month size (a four pack of 2 ply) supply of Scotty tissue.  Then I was forced to wait in an express lane (no less) for twenty minutes to buy the damn thing.

At least my bottom is happy now.

I'm not looking forward to going home in this mess tonight, however.

Oh, and last night on the way home I spotted a gray fox making his way across the street.  I almost thought it was a cat, but its head was too big and the tail too puffy.  As I stared at it I made a cute little "cooing" noise to attract its attention, it turned to look at me -- yep, that's when I knew it was not a cat, but a fox -- then it got frightened and took off like hell.  It looked skinny and hungry.  Poor thing.  I think it's not just the birds who have a hard time finding food during a blizzard!