I hopped on the Surly a little after five o’clock with a single-minded focus: ducklings. I saw some a couple weeks ago when I went kayaking with K. and M., and I heard through the grapevine that the ducklings were getting big. And there’s nothing cuter than teen ducks. I cheerfully zipped over to Bayou St. John, fully expecting to see dozens of the furry little guys. No such luck. Ducks, no ducklings, and no small amount of disappointment, though I did get to see some cute dogs and B. from the Rails-to-Trails Mid-City mapping project, strolling the bayou with his very pregnant wife. It was a beautiful day, and after I got over my duckling disappointment, I enjoyed my ride along Lafitte back to the Quarter. I stopped to take a picture of this massive pile of abandoned road signs–mostly STOP–behind a fence topped with barbed wire at the New Orleans Signal Shop. I couldn’t tell if it really was a sign shop, or if this is just where old signs go to die. The other side of the lot featured street signs, and down the block there were piles of traffic signal lights. If you need any of those things, and can jump barbed wire, I advise you to head here. A woman stopped and asked me if I was a reporter, which made sense since I was snapping a lot of pictures of something not at all picturesque, and I quickly said no, asked her why she asked. No reason, she said. I write on my own time, I told her, about stuff I see. I wonder what she’d have told me if I’d told her I was a reporter. I don’t imagine there’s a soul in this town without a story that needs to be told.