9th shave, really getting into the swing of things
tl'dr version: Pretty much same as the last one, tried a little ATG but was very tough so I stopped.
Readers Digest version
Got my 9th under my belt, and I feel my shaving technique is really starting to get proper and at ease. I did another long strop session, as the last one turned out such great results. I did my extensive beard prep in the shower of shampoo along with the hair, lather it good, let conditioner sit for the rest of the shower.
My soap bowl is made of soapstone, and it seems to impart a little color to the soap if I soak the soap with water while I shower. At first I thought pieces of the soapstone were coming off, but then I realized it was just the soap picking up the color. Who knows what else it is picking up, so in the future I won't soak my soap so much. I've gotten good results in the past without doing so, so I don't think it will be a problem.
Shave was wonderful. Used the dovo again. Short strokes and frequent readjustment of the skin stretching hand are really providing me with good shaves. After my first WTG pass, I decided to restrop before doing a second pass, which was nice. I relathered and stropped away and the 2nd XTG pass went very smoothly.
When I was done, I ran my hand over my face and felt a few rough spots, so tried some ATG over the area. It pulled very heavily though, so I just let it go.
After shave burns like a son of a b***h. I kinda like it though, makes me feel like a man.
10th shave, first ATG, oh so smooth!
Had save number 10 last night, but didn't get around to my journal till today.
All my prep is same as before. In shower, shampoo, lather good, let the conditioner sit, yada yada yada.
Stropping is kinda a pain with a lousy strop. Looking for a replacement as I type as a matter of fact. Maybe I'll turn this one into a pasted. I can still strop just fine, it just takes awhile because only a foot of the strop is flat enough to do the job properly.
I did a little experiment with my shave lather this time. I was running low on my MWF, and so after I loaded my brush up with it, I put a dob of kissmyface in my scuttle and mixed them together. It didn't really work any wonders, but I didn't hurt anything either. Doubt I will do it again though, as the MWF and Kissmyface have very different aromas, and when I mixed them they kind of canceled each other out. In the future I will just use one or the other. I've found both soaps to be great, but I think I like the MWF a little better.
Anyway, onto the shave. My normal pass is going very quickly now, and have a couple of XTG under my belt. I tried some ATG the last few times without much success. This time I did another really solid stropping before my ATG, and instead of going directly against the grain, I went at a 45 degree angle which worked much better. I also found I had to stretch the skin a LOT more than I had been. Its funny how I think I'm stretching as much as I can, then find that when I went ATG, I could find ways to stretch it more. :) My skin was sooooo smooth afterward, and SWMBO couldn't stop touching my face. I ended up getting a nice face massage simply because she loved how smooth it was :).
One thing of note, while I was doing my chin I had a single amazingly smooth and perfect stroke. Usually the chin is a pain to shave, but this one stroke just cut through every like a hot knife threw butter and left a nice smooth patch. Usually I need to do a lot of little tiny strokes to get all the hairs, so this really took me by surprise. More of a stroke of luck than intentional technique, but its nice to see what is possible. I wonder how long it will be until I can shave my chin like that every time.
One other thing I found interesting. I figured that since this was my first time doing 3 passes (WTG, XTG, and XTG) that my bay rum would sting more than ever. When I splashed it on, I was pleasantly surprised to find it hardly stung at all! I think this is from 2 things. For one, I've been straight shaving for almost a month now so my skin is probably adapting and thickening. Secondly my technique is continually improving, especially when it comes to how much pressure is against my skin. Now days its almost none, so I don't think I'm irritating the skin as much. For whatever reason, it was nice to splash on the bay rum and not have an OUCH!
In other new, I got a nice puma blade that needs some scales. I scored it off ebay for 21 bucks. It has a nice edge (although I will send it off for some honing) and not much hone wear.
Well, that's all for now.
Lather well my friends!