Spring allergies

[rekztul]

I live in a part of the US that has been very adherent to mask-wearing for the last year, so almost all sneezes I have seen in person have been into masks. Because of this, I have been pretty curious how people would sneeze after masks came off. And with pollen counts through the roof, I have been pleasantly surprised to see some great (presumably) allergy sneezes. These have been some of my favorites.

The first one was a day or two after mask requirements were lifted for vaccinated people here. A young, attractive man was wearing shorts and a tight t-shirt – a mask dangling on his wrist. He was leaning on a wall by himself near an apartment entryway looking down and texting / typing on his phone. He paused and brought a hand up to rub the bottom of his nose, before returning to texting. Apparently, that was not enough. His fingers slowed and stopped, and he sneezed an airy CHOOOOO vaguely down towards his chest. He opened his eyes and resumed typing. Neither he nor anyone else on the sidewalk seemed to bat an eye.

Next is my girlfriend, who suffers from spring allergies. We were walking in a nearby park. It was relatively crowded, though no one was near us, and without warning she tilted her head forward and sneezed a breathy and wet eeeeechewww. I asked her why she didn’t cover her mouth (she knows about the fetish), and she said that it came on too fast to do anything. A few minutes later she quickly raised a loose fist towards her face, slowed to a near stop and bent over with a harsher aaaaCHEWWWW. “That was a big sneeze,” she commented. I smiled and we continued onward.

Later that week, we met up with some friends whom we haven’t seen for a long time in the park. We caught up, including on how they had tried hard to stay safe throughout the pandemic. While chatting the girlfriend turned away from all of us, paused for a good three seconds with her eyes closed in anticipation, and sneezed a quiet but clearly articulated aaaaaachhooooo towards the grass behind her. This spurred a conversation about her and her boyfriend’s allergies. She described how each time he comes home, he will sneeze over and over again. Fittingly, a while later her boyfriend was telling us a random story when he quickly turned away from us to let out desperate CHHHOOOOO before winding up for a heartier AAACHOOOOO over his shoulder. He turned back towards us nonchalantly excused himself before continuing his story.

Over the course of the pandemic, I’ve seen a lot of uncovered or hand sneezes on zoom, but I was curious whether we were entering into a new, hygienic world irl. The last few weeks suggests not.

[ID2006]

Nice obs