Was just at the airport. Waited 2.5 hours in line to be told that ticketing will show up tomorrow at 7 am. Then went home and was on hold for 4 hours. You are lucky if you call and don't get a busy tone.
But my story isn't bad. Hearing other people's story at the airport in line was shocking. Family with kids stuck in connections for days. No hotels, little food, crowded lines. Bags? Somewhere in the country.
So it really depends upon what you want out of your research career. Part of being a successful researcher is making an impact on the community. This involves producing works that the community finds useful. I've always looked at making my code available as another avenue to help increase the impact of my work. In my case, many more people have used my public codes than have ever read my papers.
You have limited time. I'd prioritize that time on what you think others will find useful.
Don't worry about ugly code. There are research codes with 1k+ stars on GitHub that are ugly. They have so many stars because people find them useful.
You absolutely don't have to publish your code, or anything else of that matter. Don't let the the drive for impact on the community force you into working on something you're not interested in.
What would it take for southwest to remedy the station for you?
I know it's hard to say. You may never get your bags.
I'm basically valuing any future southwest credit as $0. All of my air miles at $0 too :(