Three Cute Little Puppies and Six Adorable Little Kitties Forgotten in Katrina Aftermath: Rumor

NEW ORLEANS (HAND) - Three cute little puppies and six adorable little kitties were left in a pile of their own ordure by animal hospital staff who escaped the rising floodwaters without so much as a thought for the helpless little critters, according to a rumor by a guy I talked to on the corner.

"Yeah, I heard they were the cutest, most adorable little puppies and kitties you ever saw," the guy said, "and a guy over on the next block says they were living in their own shit."

The guy could not say whether the helpless, wide-eyed little cutesy-poos were rescued by brave civilians who heard their pitiful little cries for help and braved filth- and vermin-strewn waters to pull them to safety, or whether the little puppies and kitties were left to die hideously by a callous federal government that hates blacks, Jews, gays, Muslims, and the handicapped.

The story of the cute, cuddly, doomed animals is just one of a number of rumors that have been circling in the pestilential hellhole that once was New Orleans. A guy a few blocks away swore he'd heard someone talking about an 86-year-old woman who had to drag herself and her adorable 6-year-old great-granddaughter to safety with her teeth when "some pig-assed cop" told the pitiful woman, "fuck you, lady, I got mine."

The source could not immediately confirm or deny other rumors that the grandmother's clothes had been stolen by looters, leaving her to dress herself in rags and (according to another guy across town who heard it from his brother) used toilet paper.

Coast Guard Vice Adm. Thad Allen, principal officer of the federal response to the hurricane, chastised the media - the saintly, intrepid guardians of truth and justice - for "spreading these unsubstantiated, uncorroborated rumors. I think it only serves to cause hysteria at a time when we most need to keep our heads," he said.

The rest of Allen's press conference was cancelled when someone shouted, "Hey, this guy across the street said he heard about a woman who had to eat her own child to survive!" Four journalists were slightly injured in the resulting stampede, along with two gerbils from a nearby school, who had their cute little heads bashed in, I swear. I saw it with my own eyes. It was awful.