The trials of being glamorous

So, most of my costumes are trimmed in feather boas. This is incredibly handy to disguise all sorts of oddness in my body shape.
Of course, on a regular basis they get dirty, especially around the neck line, so I wash them. Yeah, I know, it sounds like the last thing to do but i wrap the costume up in a pillow case and tie it tight to minimise the battering the feathers and sequins get and chuck it in my machine on a cool wash.
Now, no matter how tight I tie the pillow cases a few feathers will always come loose.
Last weekend, it being so very hot, many of my costumes were drenched in sweat after a shows so, with a nice sunny and slightly breezy Sunday looming, I decided to wash several at once.
All was good til I opened the pillow cases and emptied out the costumes. I hung them on my washing line, turned the pillow cases inside out and ended up with a lawn resembling a turkey plucking yard. There were feathers of all sorts of colours everywhere.
What to do?
The logical thing was to hoover them up. So this afternoon, much to the bemusement of the neighbours, I dragged my Henry (pun intended) around the garden on an extension lead for 15 minutes and, voila, the cat is no longer going mad chasing feathers round the garden.