While New Orleans got tourists flocking there from around the world looking for good times, music and food, Baton Rouge got the politicians and the bureaucrats.

But Hurricane Katrina transformed Baton Rouge into Louisiana's largest city nearly overnight - bursting at the seams with 100,000 rescue workers and refugees.

Hotel rooms are booked, the gasoline supply is running dry, houses are selling overnight - sometimes sight unseen - and even little delicatessens are getting more orders than they can keep up with.

Though Baton Rouge avoided major storm damage, the influx of people is straining local resources. Firefighters are working 36-hour shifts to keep up with a huge increase in distress calls, mostly for people having trouble breathing or needing medication they left behind in New Orleans. Twice as many police officers as usual are on duty at all times, and they're working 12 hours a day.

Even sandwich makers at Jason's Deli are working from before dawn to late in the night. The Federal Emergency Management Agency put in an order for 75,000 meals a day, but even with workers coming in from their sister shops in Houston and Beaumont, Texas, they have still been able to fill only a quarter of the orders.

Nearly every house on the market before Katrina hit sold between Wednesday and Saturday. With 7,000 New Orleans residents in Baton Rouge-area shelters and countless others staying in the homes of friends and strangers, real estate agents are begging residents to sell.

''I had someone put in an offer $10,000 more than the asking price, and [the sellers] are still considering it,'' said one real estate agent, Kathleen Duval. ''Usually people would just be dropping dead to accept that.''