Because like I ever do anything quickly.
So after making some good headway on the tail feathers from last progblog, I eventually realised (again why could I not do this earlier) that they weren't flowing with the arm direction and when the arm bent the feathers around the elbow were doing to kink horribly. Not only that the flow of the tail feathers didn't make much sense given the overall shape of the phoenix.
Suppose that's what I get for trying for a cute fancy spray when the whole thing is a much more boring but much better flowing elongated S.