bushmills,

You always have the option of purchasing your strop (3" wide Latigo suggested) from the same Candadian vendor (Fendrihan's) that you plan to purhase your new Dovo str8 razor from. As with the previous posts try to get your razor honed by somebody knowledgable about that practice before shaving with it.

As for pastes, I would suggest holding off on that until you have several weeks/months of shaves under your belt. If you start using pastes on your razor immediately after purchasing it, you may not get the result you desired.

Just my 2 cents.