What is the past tense for duck and cover?
For an idiom like duck and cover, what are appropriate options for past tense? Three obvious possibilities:
- I ducked and covered for that event.
- I duck and covered for that event.
- I duck-and-covered for that event.
Are any or all of these acceptable?
Despite "duck and cover" qualifying as an idiomatic phrase, it's still a very basic phrase at heart. Idiomatic phrases don't generally ignore the basic rules of grammar, except in that their meanings differ from the literal meanings of the words.
The past tense for "duck and cover" should be "ducked and covered", assuming you did both things in the past.
"When the gunfire started, we ducked and covered for protection."
'Duck and cover' has not become a hyphenated word in the dictionaries I checked, remaining simply as two verbs with the conjunction 'and'. Accordingly, we should use 'ducked and covered' for the past tense.
This is working class kind of language. The sophisticated "ducked and covered" sounds correct but completely unnatural to my ear.
"Duck and covered" -- I can imagine someone saying this. I can also imagine someone reworking the construction to make it more comfortable, such as "It was time for duck and cover."