I pretty much stopped all COVID precautions back in 2022 save for avoiding travel on planes and any large gathering of people at places like conventions. But now I’m ready to even abandon those precautions. Since I work from home now, there’s really no going back to the way things were. WFH has really changed my life quite a bit more than I would have thought.
I never did anything different. Germs/viruses are least of my concerns. Eat, drink and supplement for immunity, Ionic Silver, Echinacea Angustifolia, Oregon Grape and Elderberry tincture if symptoms manifest. Masks cause more harm than good. Lucifer’s pharma’s mainstream is health and freedom’s ENEMY!!
That rings true for me. I’ve started playing bridge without a mask, and letting small numbers is friends in my house unmasked. But I’m reducing precautions, not yet abandoning then.
I’m still not eating in indoor restaurants, except very rarely. I’m still wearing a mask a the supermarket.
Unlike a lot of you, I’m pretty gregarious, and i never really stopped hugging. I hugged my mother during the depths of the pandemic, and confessed it to our doctor, who sent me an article on safe hugging. (Short version: unless you are face to face, hugging isn’t much of a covid risk. Go for it.) When square dancing returned with masks and other restrictions, i hugged a lot of my friends, with both of us wearing masks. I enjoy dancing in a room with lots of people, but usually mask while doing it. I expect to mask on airplane and other public transit for the rest of my life.
I posted this in another COVID thread thins morning:
I closed with “COVID is over.” By which I meant that the public health reaction to COVID is over and now it is simply an endemic part of the human condition as is flu, common cold, heart disease, cancer, and bad driving. COVID certainly exists and infects; it just isn’t special nor does it warrant special precautions.
Or at least that’s how the public at large is now treating it.
Socially, I’m largely back to what I was doing prior to 2020. I just spent five days at a large gaming convention (about 15,000 attendees), and it felt largely like how it felt pre-COVID, with the exception of there being a very small minority (less than 5%) of attendees who were wearing masks. We were sitting around tables playing games, hugging friends, going to bars and restaurants, etc.
Similarly, I’m back to going over to friends’ houses to hang out, play games, etc., and when I go out, whether it’s to a friend’s house, or to go shopping, I’m pretty much never wearing a mask at this point, unless it’s requested.
That said, one thing that I’m not doing as often as I did before is dining out: not because I have any particular issues with it, but in the intervening three years, my wife has become more physically limited (her knees have gotten really bad), and so, she just can’t get around as easily now, and seems pretty disinterested in going out to eat.
Work is a different story: prior to 2020, I was working hybrid anyway, and WFH one or two days a week. Now, I’m close to 100% WFH, maybe going into the office once a month. The agency is really struggling with figuring out how to get people to come back to the office, but for me, nearly all of my teammates aren’t located in my office anyway (they’re spread all over the U.S.), and I can be on a conference call with them from my house as easily as I can do the same from the office.
I’m back to making very occasional business trips, but there’s been a grand total of four of those in the last year (probably half of what there were pre-COVID); however, at least one factor there is that our budgets are being more tightly scrutinized now, and greater justification is needed for a trip.
Socially, I’m largely back to what I was doing prior to 2020, except that I’m one of the small minority wearing a mask (N95 or KF94) and I’m not eating much in restaurants. But I’m hanging out with friends, dancing, hugging, visiting, etc.
I do plan to visit Israel, and I’ll have to eat indoors there, I expect. I decided to accept that risk. But I will mostly mask.
I’m curious about this one. Is this a COVID precaution? I was under the impression that COVID on surfaces turned out to not be an issue.
I’m wondering about those of you who are being careful. Are you bothered by people who don’t continue to take precautions? In the high-covid period, I was certainly upset by those who refused to take it seriously (wearing masks was the obvious sign). Now, I’m fine with whatever people choose to do.
In the very early days of the pandemic, when the transmission methods weren’t fully understood, advice to wipe down anything entering the home, and/or let it sit for a couple of days before touching it, was pretty common. IIRC, once the science became clearer, and that they learned that the transmission vector was nearly always aerosols, that advice kind of went away.
But, not everyone heard that, or some may have chosen to err on the side of caution. My sister-in-law never heard that the “let it sit for a few days” guidance had been rescinded, and a few months ago, when my wife mentioned that she was using groceries which I’d just picked up at the store, my SIL completely freaked out*: “What are you doing?!? You need to let the groceries sit so the virus dies!!!” Yes, she was still quarantining her groceries for three days before putting them in the pantry. Even when we shared with her some articles with the updated guidance, she didn’t care.
*- It should be noted that “completely freaking out” over one thing or another is one of my SIL’s preferred pastimes. 
Completely back to normal. 100% in-office work, travel/restaurants/social events the same as pre 2020. The only remaining COVID precaution in my daily life is my dental office, which still requires everyone to mask when not undergoing a procedure.
I retired in May of 2020 which was planned in November of 2019 so my life is radically different but that’s probably not in the spirit of the OP.
In April of this year I was called for jury duty and masks were required in the jury assembly room. It was the first time I had to wear one in many months. Since the trial would have gone through a planned vacation, I was deferred and had to go back last week and masks were no longer required. At some point in the interim, the policy changed.
I’m definitely in the “better safe than sorry” mode when it comes to letting newly-bought stuff sit for 48 hours. Silly of me, probably, I know.
Yeah, since I think they are no longer worried about it being carried in on objects. We were a titch paranoid about that at the very beginning, but have long since quit worrying.
We do still wear masks when going places, though I’m sure I’ve forgotten a time or two, and we are a rarity. Not planning any trips on transit any time soon, but I’m sure we’d wear masks the entire time; we caught COVID on the train last September despite being masked.
We’ve simply gotten out of the habit of going to movie theaters - which is sort of a pity as I have about 20 prepaid tickets to use at the nearest chain!
We are no longer too worried about dining in restaurants; I’d avoid a really crowded one for several reasons. We do tend to go at oddball hours, though.
So, all in all, I guess we’re mostly back to normal here.
For varying degrees of “bothered”, I guess so. Or at least, by late last year I was. People were in SUCH a hurry to get rid of those onerous “wear a mask once in a while” rules, regardless of how risky such behavior was. I’m fairly high risk (all the usual comorbidities) and frankly, every single one of those morons was threatening my life.
But these days, watching people go out and about without masks, I mentally roll my eyes. On the other hand, do I expect EVERYONE to continue to live as if the emergency was still so, well, emergent?
No more precautions for me for over a year.
I do work from home now and that’s likely to be permanent. 100% computer based job. Too many people moved away or were hired from remote locations for our office to really function the way it used to.
Got Covid this spring. Just fatigue (for the duration of the illness) and cold symptoms for me. Ironically I might have gotten it while in the hospital to visit my mom who was effectively terminal. So I could not be there for her last two days of life. She was not really conscious, was 98 and had been in decline for a while, so I don’t feel too bad about it and couldn’t help it anyway.
This kind of thing has led to me to give up on masks. I too caught covid during the “masking period.” I’m sure it reduces the chance and probably delays getting the virus, but over time with enough interactions, I figure I’m going to get it. If I’m going to get it anyway, I’d much prefer life without a mask. I know many think it’s not a big inconvenience, but for me it’s quite uncomfortable.
I’m still wary of theaters, but one great thing about the expanded use of reserved seating is that we’ll check a film online about 15 minutes before we’d need to leave for it, and buy tickets where there’s like 10 people in the theater. Usually a few more people show up, but I don’t think I’ve been in a theater more than 10% full since pre-covid.
Also, wearing a mask does more to protect OTHERS from catching it from YOU. It’s not completely useless in preventing you from catching it, but not nearly as good as if others wore masks.
As noted, we did eventually catch it (I caught it on the train then shared with the household). But diligent masking likely helped us to delay it to the point where there were effective treatments.
My condolences on the loss of your mother.
This does remind me though: when we visited Florida in late February, it was because my FIL was in the hospital after having a series of strokes, and was in the process of being moved to the hospice wing. NOBODY there was wearing masks, not visitors, not staff. Except in the hospice wing - where dire-sounding signs on every door said “You must wear masks in this room! Otherwise your visiting privileges may be revoked”.
Er, what - are they afraid we’ll hasten Great-Grandpa’s death? But it’s OK if we infect everyone else in the hospital???
It’s also likely to cut your initial virus load: even if you get enough virus to make you sick, you won’t inhale as much as you would have without a mask.
I don’t know whether they still think that reducing that initial dose of virus affects how sick you get; but I did see stories saying so some time ago. (While your body’s going to produce more virus if you do come down with it, I think a lower initial load may give your immune system more time to get into gear.)
The type and fit of mask also makes a difference. I eventually found some N95’s that fit me and now, when I do wear a mask (which is no longer that often, see post somewhere above), that’s what I wear. The surgical-style masks I was using for quite a while are apparently only much good if everyone’s wearing them; they stop virus from getting out better than they stop it from getting in.
I’d neglected to mention this: I used to go to movie theaters a fair amount, but when I went to see the Dungeons & Dragons film in April, that was my first time in a movie theater in 3 1/2 years. I’ll likely start going more often again, but may never wind up being in the theater as often as I used to.
My mother spent the last year or two of her life in memory care. Obviously Covid was going on while this happened. The place did take some measures to prevent transmission. I think everyone was vaccinated there, they did do temp screenings and masking during periods of high transmission.
But as far as the masking goes, it’s different slapping on a mask for going into the grocery store and wearing one 24/7. People who live all of their lives in this communal space, there was and is going to be a lot of resistance to wearing a mask 24/7 for people that already are uncomfortable, in limited health that is never going to improve. The mask wearing inside the memory care place was nominal, the residents did not want to wear them. My mom did test positive once, asymptomatic. I have pointed out at various time the issue with mask wearing and people not wearing them in their own homes for understandable reasons.