he whole nation wants to do their part to help the victims of Hurricane Katrina, but a Madison, Wisconsin man is doing so much he makes all the other volunteers and charity donors look like dried puke. For Albert Pohl Martinson hasn't merely taken in three or four family members or refugees from New Orleans: He's taken in a whole jazz band.

"I just wanted to do what I could," Martinson told a deluge of fawning media standing on his front lawn. "So I said I would take in the first group of refugees I could. I sent them bus tickets and had them carted up here immediately. And then, being a good citizen, I called the local news to make sure they were informed."

However, Martinson didn't stop and giving the 5-man combo all the food, shelter, and clean water they needed; he also bought them sparkling fresh instruments so they could take their mind off their troubles.

"I've always enjoyed the real music and culture of working-class people," said Martinson, a retired advertising sales manager. "Not particularly jazz, more the rich and textured Delta blues. Some jazz, I guess… this Dixieland stuff isn't really what I thought I was getting when I agreed to—you know what? It doesn't matter. I'm just trying to give back something to a community that has lost so much."

Martinson, upon opening his front door to go back inside, was greeted with the jovial and unrelenting blasts of trumpets playing, "When the Saints Come Marching In."

"Oh, goody—they're still playing!"

Martinson is not the only one opening his home to those in need from the disaster—only the best. But across the nation, many Americans are staking out their piece of great historic tragedy. Like Amy and Morrie Callum of Albany, New York, who took in New Orleans legendary jazz guitarist Halo Jones.

"It's horrific to see all the death and destruction left in Katrina's wake," sobbed Amy, while her husband nodded perfunctorily. "I had to do something. Like everyone else, I was thinking, 'What can I do? Little ol' me?' But I didn't let that hurt me. I got on the phone. I called disaster-relief people. I told them, 'Get me a jazz guitarist.' And they did."

Sure thing, less than a week later, Jones arrived via cab with his trademark Yamaha acoustic.

"He loves to play that thing," said Morrie with a smile. "Honestly, he won't stop playing it."

Still, there are others. Few who have given to disaster relief groups can match the sheer generosity of Ketcham, North Carolina strip club owner Paco Wiley, who opened his home and his club to 13 refugees from a New Orleans brothel, including 12 high-priced prostitutes and a madame, Ms. Louise.

"You've got to remember these are people like you and me," said Paco, wiping his forehead with a lacey pink bra, in one of his rare public appearances outside his club. "You have to give them back their independence. Give them back their dignity. So immediately, rather than just give them charity and let them live off my contributions, I put the ladies to work for me. It's all in the name of relief, folks."

And we spell relief with media coverage—oodles and oodles of media coverage.

n the wake of the catastrophic flooding that hit New Atlantis/New Orleans this week following Hurricane Katrina, tens of thousands of refugees have been evacuated from their submerged homes and treated to an exciting whirlwind tour of America’s domed sporting facilities.

“Don’t worry, the government will take care of you all,� explained President Bush, who drastically cut funding for levee upgrades in order to pay for a war in Iraq, so terrorists wouldn’t be able to destroy a major American city like New Orleans. “We’re sending water wings and crossword puzzle books on the double.�

Upon being plucked from their rooftops and attics after breeched levees on Lake Pontchartrain submerged the city in up to twenty feet of water, thousands of New Orleans residents were transported to the Superdome, home of the NFL’s New Orleans Saints, for emergency lodging, beer, and giant cheese-filled pretzels.

“I really appreciated that they opened the Superdome to us,� expressed flooding victim LaTrevor Wynn. “But I gotta say they gouged the fuck out of us for boat parking at the stadium. I was saying we should park a few blocks away and swim to the stadium, but there was some guy in a wheel chair who wanted us to just pony up the money. I guess he was rich or something.�

Good spirits quickly turned foul, however, when the stadium’s power and sewage systems both failed, and they ran out of souvenir air horns. Before long, deteriorating conditions and asshole Saints fans forced the evacuation of the Superdome, which by then smelled strongly of poor people.

Refugees from the Superdome, which is now almost completely under water, were moved by bus to the Astrodome in Houston, formerly home to over 30 years of bad baseball courtesy of the National League’s Houson Astros, as well as the catastrophic 1992 Republican National Convention that offered America one last chance to listen to Ronald Reagan flapping his cheek meat.

Relief efforts at the Astrodome were short-lived however, as over 100 refugees suffered knee injuries from the stadium’s unforgiving Astroturf playing surface. Several reported serious cases of rugburn as well.

Re-refugees from the Astrodome were then bussed to Minneapolis, Minnesota, where a disappointing summer performance by the local Twins has left plenty of empty seats in the Metrodome.

“This place blows,� complained disaster victim and dome expert Marvin Milk. “It has all the ambiance of a bus station and the hot dogs are gross.�

Fellow refugees agreed about the hot dogs, but gave high marks to the stadium’s nacho hats, a popular refugee staple. Problems arose at the Metrodome, however, after some disenfranchised dickcheese left the stadium’s back door open, allowing all the air to escape and collapsing the dome’s pressurized roof. Some blame the mishap on the Metrodome’s short-sighted no-smoking policy.

The remaining refugees who didn’t take to wading through Minneapolis’ many metropolitan lakes out of sheer habit were shipped to either the Skydome in Toronto, Canada, or the Tacomadome in Tacoma, Washington.

“Man, this sucks. I knew we were going to get the Tacomadome,� bitched flooding victim Marcy Flobere of New Orleans.

A few lucky victims were bussed instead to Tropicana Field in St. Petersberg, Florida, which has a part time gig as the home of baseball’s Tampa Bay Devil Rays in-between housing refugees from the region’s monthly hurricane disasters.

Tropicana Field has not been without its share of problems, however, ranging from occasional hurricane damage to the roof and overcrowded bathrooms to the stinky, lousy baseball taking place on-field.

“This has been a disaster. I’ve had to watch four Devil Rays’ games this week,� groused Tropicana Field refugee Homer Angus. “This is worse than the hurricane.�

Government officials have assured the tired, huddled masses that they will be allowed to return to their homes in New Orleans as soon as disaster-relief workers can find the city.

You may be asking yourself what do I mean by my slightly smug title? Am I mocking the tragically short and tortured life of a little girl killed in a massive campaign of genocide? No. I embrace Anne Frank's courageous spirit and indomitable will more than ever, now that I have had to spend secretive nights with my own "family" here at the commune, hiding out from imaginary government ninjas, fabricated Al Qaeda terrorists, and any number of made-up enemies that forced us to take to the road in recent weeks.

As a fresh reminder (let's pretend we're on the second part of a two-part sitcom, and you need filling in), the commune staff, sans Ritalin poster child Omar Bricks, fled their home offices weeks ago under the presumed threat of international terrorists trying to kill us. Why? Who knows. Perhaps in Red Bagel's belabored mind, he pictured some insidious plot to turn the commune offices into a potent missile to strike at government and financial targets. But we overran our attackers, whom I personally witnessed were carrying weapons that looked remarkably like toys, including a lime-green Super Soaker, and took to the road.

This is a natural reaction to a possible terrorist attack, of course: Load all your staff and whatever equipment you can carry into a Partridge family-style bus and drive west as if you're following the Grateful Dead. Reporting the incident to the police, federal agents, or the Department of Homeland Security would only tip your hand that you're important enough to be a terrorist target. And I'm sure a nasty new piece of paper is added to your FBI file, so it's best to avoid contacting the authorities at all costs. This is the rationalization of Red Bagel's mind, of course, and it's precisely why I've been writing angry letters to doctors to have the man committed for years now.

Not that being on the run from international assassins with the commune staff was all bad. Some of it was very bad. Some of it was agonizingly bad. So I might draw a pie chart, if that were my forte, and split it roughly into equal parts about 33% bad, 33% very bad, and %34 agonizingly bad. With a potential margin of error that it might be 99% agonizingly bad. You try sharing the same bathroom that Stigmata Spent and Ramon Nootles are using. One day of that and you'll be ready to walk in downtown Falluja with a sign reading "Islam blows!"

It was every bit as bad as I say. Boris Utzov doesn't speak a lick of decipherable English, of course, but it's impossible to understand him anyway since the man is always eating. I now know why all his columns are stained with ketchup, mustard, and French fry grease. But at least his broken English is a lot cleaner than anything coming out of Ivana Folger-Balzac's mouth; the woman could have made Sam Kinison blush. I've never heard such abundant use of the F-word just to ask a hitchhiker for directions.

All his money and Bagel wouldn't even spring for a hotel room. Well, he did get a hotel room, but he wouldn't let any of us stay in it since he was using it for the "commune dummies" he built out of old mannequins. "Just a trap to catch the bad guys," Bagel told us, rubbing his hands together in his usual scheme-talking manner. So basically we all end up sleeping on the bus seats, some of us two to a seat. I'm not sure which was more disturbing, Shabozz Wertham's audible racist sleep-mumbling or Boner Cunningham's somnambulist groping. What am I saying? Of course Boner was the worst. Without a doubt.

I'm just not cut out for this group. Believe me, if I was employable elsewhere, I would leave them all behind. When the most intellectual conversation you can get is with an 8-year-old mail clerk, you know you're in the wrong place. Come to think of it, why did I even follow them? It's not like anyone put a gun to my head. Well, not a real gun.

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