Afterfeathers Up!

Ducks and Chucks,

I am on vacation at the moment, basking in the sun with my best frenemy Sir Mallard Jones. But I thought, while I’m here, I would share a little ductionary definition of a term we ducks like to use—“afterfeathers up!”

Your afterfeathers are the soft, downy bits at the bottom of your feathers. Ducks can actually stay warm by fluffing up our afterfeathers, but “afterfeathers up” isn’t just a way of saying, “Duck me, it’s cold, so you’d better put on a sweater!” It can also mean, “What you’re about to do might be very ducking scary, so prepare yourself by doing some calming qu-affirmations.”

For instance, the first time I watched The Conjuring at the cinema, I passed my friends Frabjous, Duck F, and the Codfather on my way in. They’d just seen the movie and were waddling out, looking pale and shaky from beak-to-flippers. Every one of them squeaked “afterfeathers up!” as they passed me. ln retrospect, they clearly wanted me to prepare myself for scary goosebumps. But I thought they were all just very chilly and were warning me to puff up and keep warm. That is why I just thought, “Well, I’m a hot duck who could do with some cooling.”

The result? Once the film was rolling and that demon emerged from its hiding place on top of the wardrobe, I was so unprepared that I lost my lunchtime pondweed all over my best pair of duck-jeans.

Wardrobe-crawling demons are a particular duck-fear of mine. Every time I have to get out a new shirt, I have to cross my flippers in case there’s some ducking undead beastie lurking behind my neatly stacked slipper-flippers.

What did I learn from this whole movie theater incident? Word misunderstandings happen. But Rotten Tomatoes is a ducking great way of working out whether a movie contains wardrobe demons before you head off to buy your movie tickets.

Loves ya,

Duck T