Thread: Howdy from Montana.

Originally Posted by Longhaultanker

Contact has been made with Larry for a meet up in Butte. Looking forward to this. Story and pictures to follow. I intend to focus on fundamentals.

Anyone else think it might be weird for two grown men to get a shower room at a truck stop to practice straight razor shaving?

Lol Larry, RUN! Jk I'm sure you will be in great hands.

Originally Posted by mtwoodwrkr

I suspected as much. Can you recommend another strop with the linen secondary strop? I am not against buying another $100 strop if that is what it takes to succeed.
Larry

Since you have a SRD strop you can just buy a replacement if you wished. They also offer webbing and premium linen pieces. That said I have had srd strops with the felt and they will perform just fine. 1 recommendation would be check out the stropping video by AFDavis in the top of the stropping forum. Is up top in red (sticky). He gives an excellent example of great stropping technique

Welcome to the forum.

When Larry and I talked on the phone yesterday, I said I could be available both Tuesday afternoon and / or Wednesday early afternoon. Larry chose the "and" option. We met about 4:15 PM and continued to about 9:30 PM. Larry and I are about the same age, which made conversation less taxing and more relatable. It helped that Larry has driven an 18 wheeler before in a previous life.

A "new" guy always has a lot of questions. Larry has a nice Ralf Aust 7/8 Spanish point razor, purchased from SRD. We took a table at the rear of the drivers lounge area. He brought his bag of gear and I had mine. Since we are meeting twice while I am here, we planned today should be conversation regarding fundamentals. Out came all the gear: strops, hones, shaving brushes, soaps, and razors. I showed him examples of point styles, widths. I showed horse hair, boar bristle, badger, and synthetic brushes. Out came the strops; my red latigo, his premium from SRD with felt second. Larry's strop is in good condition, not needing any supplement. Yes, his skill set can be described as a novice with a straight razor, despite his long interest in woodworking and honing tools. It's just a different skills set. Larry is a mature man, a quick study, and will progress as experience grows.

We finished out the evening by stropping out his Ralf Aust razor. I gave it about 200 strokes on my Arkansas Translucent travel stone, stropped it twice, 100 strokes on his Premium and 100 on my red latigo. It was popping hair off arms, legs, exposed bellies, but tomorrow is the real test. After my morning delivery we plan to reconvene, get a shower room, lather up, and shave. Nothing like learning by doing. Should be fun.

Part two with pictures forthwith.

Regrettably, our shave time together did not take place due to demands of my job. A good time and experience, however, was had yesterday. Larry and I have already exchanged several text messages today and a phone call. I suspect he will have some what to say here in due course. One thing is definite: I came away with a new SR buddy.