Thread: Note to Self:

Note to self: never spend more than 2hrs shaving, from strop to strop, just for the fun of it, again.

Did you do a full body shave?

Good way to make your razor rusty unless you wiped it dry between the 36 passes.

*laugh* Been there too, Crawler.

The razor burn will subside in a day or two. Been there, done that.

It was my fourth shave. Noob fact: it takes us longer to shave.

Until last night, LadyRyeBread has kindly been my lather assistant, starting and building it while I shower. Being Vacation Relief, my schedule changed again, so she was asleep. And let's just say that when I'm left to my own devices, I take my sweet time doing just about anything, if the mood strikes. Plus, in my last shave, I missed some spots goin lefty.

"If it's worth doing once, it's worth doing right the first time." -My Father.

Last shave, I added a "bone" sponge for washing a car to wipe my razor instead of rinse it. Aside from the lather not coming completely off, it has worked great.
It all started with a nice long stropping session. Work on muscle memory, weight of the blade, slowly, and meticulously watching the blade to ensure even contact, left & right handed to compensate for the stabilizer could be visibly kept off the strop for both sides of the blade (even contact). First webbing, then the more rough backside of the leather, then smooth leather.

My wiping sponge being bone-dry , it was sat on my case so I could try something new: keeping my lather warm. So I used my steaming hot tap water 3/4th's the way up the outside of my lather cup sitting in the sink. Yes, I kinda took my time making the lather too. Also, taking so long to shave, the lather basically had to be rebuilt once or twice.

Having mostly fine and sparse stubble, an XTG pass is mostly useless. But feeling the need to reduce the stubble more before ATG, I did at least a total of 2 WTG passes... except maybe the underneath side of my chin. Still learning, with no muscle memory, and figuring out which grips work best in what hand for this angle & that angle; I lathered in sections to prevent loss of glide & moisture. (Learning the hard way is often the quick way as well)

So, about the last 20min of the shave itself, when I was touching up what had been missed by the other 28 passes, both my focus and my fine motor control started to wane. That's when most of the nicks happened. Tired & unconfident muscles cause a hop-skip-bleed. A brief lapse in focus when bringing my arms and the razor up into position made me cut my nose. Again.

Still less pain & blood in the end than before I found SRP and was still on cartridges. I'll write that down as a win .

Originally Posted by Crawler

It was my fourth shave. Noob fact: it takes us longer to shave.

Until last night, LadyRyeBread has kindly been my lather assistant, starting and building it while I shower. Being Vacation Relief, my schedule changed again, so she was asleep. And let's just say that when I'm left to my own devices, I take my sweet time doing just about anything, if the mood strikes. Plus, in my last shave, I missed some spots goin lefty.

"If it's worth doing once, it's worth doing right the first time." -My Father.

Last shave, I added a "bone" sponge for washing a car to wipe my razor instead of rinse it. Aside from the lather not coming completely off, it has worked great.
It all started with a nice long stropping session. Work on muscle memory, weight of the blade, slowly, and meticulously watching the blade to ensure even contact, left & right handed to compensate for the stabilizer could be visibly kept off the strop for both sides of the blade (even contact). First webbing, then the more rough backside of the leather, then smooth leather.

My wiping sponge being bone-dry , it was sat on my case so I could try something new: keeping my lather warm. So I used my steaming hot tap water 3/4th's the way up the outside of my lather cup sitting in the sink. Yes, I kinda took my time making the lather too. Also, taking so long to shave, the lather basically had to be rebuilt once or twice.

Having mostly fine and sparse stubble, an XTG pass is mostly useless. But feeling the need to reduce the stubble more before ATG, I did at least a total of 2 WTG passes... except maybe the underneath side of my chin. Still learning, with no muscle memory, and figuring out which grips work best in what hand for this angle & that angle; I lathered in sections to prevent loss of glide & moisture. (Learning the hard way is often the quick way as well)

So, about the last 20min of the shave itself, when I was touching up what had been missed by the other 28 passes, both my focus and my fine motor control started to wane. That's when most of the nicks happened. Tired & unconfident muscles cause a hop-skip-bleed. A brief lapse in focus when bringing my arms and the razor up into position made me cut my nose. Again.

Still less pain & blood in the end than before I found SRP and was still on cartridges. I'll write that down as a win .

Ahhh the good old days, it may be hard to believe now, but in 6 months you'll wonder how and why you would shave any other way than with a straight, and the cool thing about it is the learning curve never ends...enjoy the journey.

Like your dad's quote.

Similarly: "If you don't have the time to do it right, you must have the time to do it twice."

I guess you didn't have to do it twice this time, did you? 😎



B.

His strop is now paper thin

Originally Posted by Scareface

His strop is now paper thin

Lol, not quite. Being so deliberate in my budding technique, and hawk-eyeing the blade as I strop, each lap probably took at least 4 seconds. +weight of the blade pressure. My strop barely looks used .