Honey came back yet again

August 23, 2017 • 7:15 am

My duck Honey is clearly messing with me. After a full day’s absence, in which I convinced myself that she was gone and tried to accept it, she reappeared at lunchtime yesterday. We communed at length at lunch and teatime, and much corn and many mealworms were consumed, but this roller-coaster of emotions is unsettling me. When a friend pointed out that Honey seemed to be my “girlfriend”, I wrote a short ditty:

You’re plumb out of luck
When your girlfriend’s a duck,
For you haven’t been granted your wish.
There isn’t much thrill
In kissing a bill,
And her feathers smell faintly of fish.

But I love her dearly. Here she is from yesterday (note the big flight feathers: she’s good to go):

I just went downstairs to give her breakfast. She’s gone again. . .

27 thoughts on “Honey came back yet again”

  1. To be honest, ProfCC(E), I don’t think she’s “messing with you”. It sounds like she’s conflicted between a drive to migrate, and confidence in a food source.
    Duck behaviour experts may well have other opinions, but I suspect that you’re going to have to apply a degree of “tough love” and close the cupboard door.

      1. Not just “let her go”, but close the cupboard door.
        I know it’s harsh. But (subject to comment from duck-behaviour experts – which do not purport to be), I suspect it’s the “right thing” to do.

    1. Yeah, but just wait till Jerry decamps for Poland, and Honey goes all “Love the One Your With”.

  4. The Devil made me do it.

    A quick search of the web tubes turned up a script of the classic Marx Brothers routine in which they ponder – rather, I’d imagine, in the manner of Ms. Hili – the age-old question: Why a Duck? Here’s the crucial section (Groucho as Hammer):

    Hammer: (pause) Well, we’ll Passover that…You’re a peach, boy. Now, here is a little peninsula, and, eh, here is a viaduct leading over to the mainland.

    Chico: Why a duck?

    Hammer: I’m alright, how are you? I say, here is a little peninsula, and here is a viaduct leading over to the mainland.

    Chico: Alright, why a duck?

    Hammer: (pause) I’m not playing “Ask Me Another,” I say that’s a viaduct.

    Chico: Alright! Why a duck? Why that…why a duck? Why a no chicken?

    Hammer: Well, I don’t know why a no chicken; I’m a stranger here myself. All I know is that it’s a viaduct. You try to cross over there a chicken and you’ll find out why a duck.

    Chico: When I go someplace I just…

    Hammer: (interrupts) It’s…It’s deep water, that’s why a duck. It’s deep water.

    Chico: That’s why a duck…

    Hammer: Look…look, suppose you were out horseback riding and you came to that stream and you wanted to ford over…You couldn’t make it, it’s too deep!

    Chico: Well, why do you want with a Ford if you gotta horse?

    Hammer: Well, I’m sorry the matter ever came up. All I know is that it’s a viaduct.

    Chico: Now look, alright, I catch ona why a horse, why a chicken, why a this, why a that…I no catch ona why a duck.

    Hammer: I was only fooling…I was only fooling. They’re gonna build a tunnel there in the morning. Now is that clear to you?

    Chico: Yes, everything excepta why a duck.

    Hammer: Well, that’s fine…then we can go ahead with this thing.

    Here’s a YouTube clip:

    https://youtu.be/v3hjo7V7TPs

  5. Is that a koi fish photobombing in the foreground? Perhaps you should befriend the koi instead. They aren’t going anywhere!

  6. “I just went downstairs to give her breakfast. She’s gone again. . .”

    ‘Alone again, naturally.’

  7. Female ducks are so fickle…here one minute, gone the next. 😉
    Just enjoying your duck stories soooo much since I’m so in love with duckies!

  8. She’s conflicted. Her instincts say go. She goes, and then her stomach says go back!

    2. Bobby Goldsboro singing Honey – I don’t think I’ve ever been able to get through that without crying.

  10. I am reminded of the war meme:

    Duck and cover
    – Honey growing her flight feathers back.

    Duck and (it’s) over
    – Jerry’s walks and his flighty bird.

  11. A friend of mine (named “Raven”) from years ago explained that to be birdy (and she was, in this way and others) was to be “productively indecisive”.

  12. “But I love her dearly.”

    “The Moving Finger writes, and having writ . . . Take the Cash,
    And let the Credit go.”

    – Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

    I’m a fine one to presume to so quote.

  14. Love your poem.

    Shouldn’t tell you this, but in the days of the dinosaurs when I was in high school, I and most of my friends were extremely naive (being Evangelical Christians). One of the girls was enamored of a boy named Chuck. At one point she was saying his name over and over and rhyming it. She came up with: “Chucky lucky f**cky ducky.” She had absolutely no idea of what she’d said. I guess her cousin and I weren’t quite as unknowing (at least of language) as we couldn’t help laughing.

  15. The earlier posting on poetry and PCC’s poetic effort about Honey reminded me of one of the few poets and poems I really understood.

    The Hunter
    by Ogden Nash

    The hunter crouches in his blind
    ‘Neath camouflage of every kind
    And conjures up a quacking noise
    To lend allure to his decoys
    This grown-up man, with pluck and luck
    is hoping to outwit a duck

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