I had a visit with my knife guy. Turns out he's not just a knife guy, he is trying to make straight razors too. We ran out of time to do much because hardness tests take a long time to do, so we'll reconvene latter. He did however point out that my stropping technique was not forceful enough. I was worried about rolling the edge, so I would put almost zero pressure on the edge of the blade as I stropped, just having all the force on the spine while there is nothing but gravity bringing the edge down on the leather. He showed me how he does it with much more force than that, since trying this new technique the shaving edge feels much sharper, the shave was a bit rough at times but I did manage to shave my whole face with no cuts or ripped hairs, so that's a big plus.

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I'll have you know I splashed my face with alcohol aftershave after using my straight razor and only cried for 20 minutes.