I checked and planes are full in both directions. I’d probably wear a mask on board but I’ve always had a hard time breathing on planes (asthma). Wearing a mask makes me cough ( a lot) and then I get a headache. I’ll likely wear one when getting on board, deplaning and in the bathroom. At my seat, unlikely.
I count every minute of every flight until it’s over. I love to go place but detest getting there. Have always been that way. And I can’t sleep on planes. Even the red eye.
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Oh I feel for you, my mom had a severe case of asthma. Somehow in my 40s, one doctor in the Bay Area prescribed some type of inhaler for me, but I didn’t use it, probably for allergies, now my allergies are almost non existent.
Good plan. Your highest chance of getting Covid (or whatever respiratory bug of the day) is at the airport or bathrooms. Crank up that air flow above your head and if possible, sit by the window.
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Look up mask ratings to find those with both high filtration and high airflow.
You will at least want to keep it on while the plane is on the ground (since they run the ventilation less on the ground). Also, if someone nearby is coughing away…
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Yep, it’s bad in the era of Covid having a hacking cough attack isn’t thought of as asthma.
@ucbalumnus We have N95 masks. I’ll use one of those probably not the best in terms of airflow but I don’t have others. Good point re: ventilation on the ground.
I have a relative with asthma who has frequent coughing spells. He very obviously pulls out his inhaler when they hit so that people around him don’t get spooked.
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I always at least wear a mask while the plane is boarding as hundreds of people shuffle by me to their seats.
I lost my mask somehow in the airport going through security my last trip as we headed back home. Sure enough, a woman in the gate area sitting in the seat behind me was coughing up a lung. We were delayed, and every seat was taken or I would have changed seats. She was masked, but her cough was really bad, and there I was without my mask. I finally just left the area and stood for over an hour until we finally boarded. I had the realization that my 2.5 year lucky streak was probably going to come to an end. I became symptomatic for Covid three days later.
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Mine is not KN95, but it’s pretty comfortable. I haven’t use it for a while and I have an ink spot in my mask, doesn’t matter, I treat it as my beauty mark, lol.
Yesterday I attended my first in person class at my local community college, everyone had to have mask to enter the building. So I’m going to be painting with this type of mask for hours.
You may want to consider getting some of these. I found them to have better airflow than other masks that I have tried.
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We are “living our lives” but that does include precautions.
A friend had a trip to Italy planned to celebrate a milestone and all her kids/grandkids were meeting up there. The first day there 2 of the families tested positive for COVID and so the whole trip and cruise had to be abandoned. They had to find a different hotel as their hotel asked them to leave once they tested positive and could not leave on the cruise. What a mess.
I was about to leave for a week at the beach when for some reason I decided to go the next morning. I woke up symptomatic and spent that week in bed. Thank goodness I did not go because I don’t know what I would have done, alone at the beach with no one to buy/bring me food or check on me. I am still coughing a month later. DH’s asthma has returned after years of not experiencing it.
So we are happily living our life with precaution, even if that did not prevent our catching COVID.
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Yes, even if the medical effects of getting COVID-19 are small or minimal for you, testing positive could mean being stranded in some place without being able to go out and enjoy the place while running up hotel and food delivery bills for quarantine.
We were at a small zoo today. You know what makes people mask up? You had to wear a mask to feed or get close to the giraffes. Everyone was wearing a mask correctly and no complaints. We just need more giraffes.
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Why did people have to mask up?
It probably will be now. Last year, there were less people actually flying. It’s picked up a lot. In addition to crowded planes…the airports are crowded too. It took us almost an hour from arrival in the airport to get to our gate. Some of that was because the gate was far away…but the TSA lines were LONG.
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The five flights we were on a couple of weeks ago were all packed. I don’t think there was an empty seat on any of them.
And after one flight got diverted due to weather, American said they had NO seats available the next day to get from Charlotte to Madison. When I insisted they put us on another airline, it took awhile but they found two seats on a United flight.
I am not looking forward to flying from Portland to Austin in October. 
All flights we and our kids have been on this year have been 100% full.
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Since I retired I picked the cheapest flights and that usually means they are crowded, so I’m hoping they will not be crowded. I also checked and the aircraft is bigger, I was surprised I could change the last minute, another sign that it’s not crowded. Really just hoping, not sure. But I’m not complaining, I paid about $50 for 2 tickets with my points. Still normally I have to pay very high taxes, never this cheap even with points.
At the Denver airport, it really is hit or miss. In June my flight left at 5 am . We were moving though TSA, but just because they’d opened another set of lanes. Probably took 30 min. In Aug, flight left at 7am and I walked right up to the agent! I didn’t even have my ID out yet. There are two different TSA options, one entirely for TSA-Precheck, one for everyone else.
Because of car trouble, I cut it pretty close with TSA out of Savannah. It took 20 minutes when it is usually just walk up and walk through.
My final flight was so full that one person didn’t have a seat. They announced that if you had a child without a ticket to make sure they are IN YOUR LAP! So the lucky person who was last on the plane had to gate check their bag and sit in the middle seat next to the lap child. Fun.
Global Entry is the secret to happiness. 
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To protect the health of the giraffes. They required masks whenever visitors were going to be close to the animals.