TX ended all mask mandates and business restrictions on March 10. But here in the woke Austin area those who choose to go maskless remain few and far between. Most stores and restaurants no longer care if you wear a mask, but like cars still sporting stale campaign bumper stickers most also still have signage saying mask are required for entry. Some have changed them to the milder phrasing that masks are “recommended”, but the operant conditioning is still in full force among the vast majority of the citizenry. And a few hardcore leftist stores still will harass you if you don’t submit to wearing a mask.

The contrast is amusing. Sam’s Club and Walmart greeters give a friendly hello when you walk into a store maskless, as do Home Depot, Lowe’s, Best Buy, and many others. But Costco greeters will bark at you and if you ignore that store personnel will hunt you down and ask you to mask up or leave. At least you now have a choice to walk out and take your business elsewhere. Fortunately almost all stores are in the “don’t care” stage of recovery, so the choice to walk out is an easy one. The problem is most locals still have masks glued to their faces as a matter of habit so resistant businesses haven’t seen a hit to their sales yet.

Each week there’s slow signs of sanity returning. Especially the further away from the city you get the more bare faces you’ll see and this weekend I noticed employees able to smile freely at customers once again in a few places.

My advice to those living in states that no longer have mask mandates is to assume you can enter any place maskless and decide to stay or leave only if and when an employee tells you they won’t let you stay if you don’t mask up. Yes, it may feel odd at first being the only one maskless in a store, but you’re making a powerful statement to the sheep that they can choose freedom for themselves and their families.

TX ended all mask mandates and business restrictions on April 11. But here in the woke Austin area those who choose to go maskless remain few and far between. Most stores and restaurants no longer care if you wear a mask, but like cars still sporting stale campaign bumper stickers most also still have signage saying mask are required for entry. Some have changed them to the milder phrasing that masks are “recommended”, but the operant conditioning is still in full force among the vast majority of the citizenry. And a few hardcore leftist stores still will harass you if you don’t submit to wearing a mask.

The contrast is amusing. Sam’s Club and Walmart greeters give a friendly hello when you walk into a store maskless, as do Home Depot, Lowe’s, Best Buy, and many others. But Costco greeters will bark at you and if you ignore that store personnel will hunt you down and ask you to mask up or leave. At least you now have a choice to walk out and take your business elsewhere. Fortunately almost all stores are in the “don’t care” stage of recovery, so the choice to walk out is an easy one. The problem is most locals still have masks glued to their faces as a matter of habit so resistant businesses haven’t seen a hit to their sales yet.

Each week there’s slow signs of sanity returning. Especially the further away from the city you get the more bare faces you’ll see and this weekend I noticed employees able to smile freely at customers once again in a few places.

My advice to those living in states that no longer have mask mandates is to assume you can enter any place maskless and decide to stay or leave only if and when an employee tells you they won’t let you stay if you don’t mask up. Yes, it may feel odd at first being the only one maskless in a store, but you’re making a powerful statement to the sheep that they can choose freedom for themselves and their families.

TX ended all mask mandates and business restrictions on April 11. But here in the woke Austin area those who choose to go maskless remain few and far between. Most stores and restaurants no longer care if you wear a mask, but like cars still sporting stale campaign bumper stickers most also still have signage saying mask are required for entry. Some have changed them to the milder phrasing that masks are “recommended”, but the operant conditioning is still in full force among the vast majority of the citizenry. And a few hardcore leftist stores still will harass you if you don’t submit to wearing a mask.

The contrast is amusing. Sam’s Club and Walmart greeters give a friendly hello when you walk into a store maskless, as do Home Depot, Lowe’s, Best Buy, and many others. But Costco greeters will bark at you and if you ignore that store personnel will hunt you down and ask you to mask up or leave. At least you now have a choice to walk out and take your business elsewhere. Fortunately almost all stores are in the “don’t care” stage of recovery, so the choice to walk out is an easy one. The problem is most locals still have masks glued to their faces as a matter of habit so resistant businesses haven’t seen a hit to their sales yet.

Each week there’s slow signs of sanity returning. Especially the further away from the city you get the more bare faces you’ll see and this weekend I noticed employees able to smile freely at customers once again in a few places.

My advice to those living in states that no longer have mask mandates is to assume you can enter any place maskless and decide to stay or leave only if and when an employee tells you they won’t let you stay if you don’t mask up.yes, it may feel odd at first being the only one maskless in a store, but you’re making a powerful statement to the sheep that they can choose freedom for themselves and their families.