Okay, so learning to use this straight razor and so far, out of three shaves, I've had zero blood shed. On my neck the hairs change direction and I'm getting a little irritation there because I don't yet know how to handle the straight razor well enough to accomodate the "swirl" pattern that is there, but it could also be because I just shaved three days in a row and I usually just do this every other day.
PLUS SIDE: I am feeling MUCH more confident after only three shaves. I'm not getting careless, but I feel that I'm starting to get a feel fro how the blade should feel when it's cutting.

But in a lot of the videos I've watched to try and figure out how to hold the razor, they guy shaving his face goes in for a 2nd shave in the direction OPPOSITE the direction of the hair growth (a.k.a. against-the-grain). Now, I will usually do a pass on the cheeks and jaws perpendicular to hair growth, but with my Gillette Sensor Excel, I could never get it to move ATG withough snagging on the hair and getting lots of ingrown hairs and causing bleeding (somehow the hair follicles would bleed from ATG). But in the spirit of trying this straight razor out properly, I thought I'd try once going against the grain.

I positioned the blade, pulled the skin taught, tried to move the blade and... nothing. It just wouldn't budge. It was like trying to move the blade through a velcro forest. I could have forced it, but I know the result would have been painful and ingrown-hairs. So I stuck to a perpendicular-to-grain 2nd pass and that went fine.

I don't usually consider myself "heavily" bearded or "bristley"... but I'm beginning to think it might be the case.

Oh well, live and learn!