Allow me to pose a question...

The woman in your life hunted for days for the perfect gift for you. She settles on what she feels is an excellent straight razor, she watches in anticipation as you unwrap your gift. It's a sub par blade that you know will leave you scarred and bloodied. What do you do? How do you react? Do you display it with pride, or do you break her heart?

This didn't happen to me, my wife knows better. But the thought skipped through my mind as we were elbow deep in wrapping paper this morning. Hopefully this didn't happen to anyone, my heart goes out to you if it did.

Luckily my wife would never do that, she knows she know next to nothing about straights and leave it to me what to get.

But IF this should have happened it would depend on how bad the razor was.
If it would be possible to save it, I would have thanked her and said it could be a nice razor with some work, but if it was a lost case I would have told her it was a very thoughtful gift, and I appreciate her effort, but unfortunatly the razor isn't going to shave again.

That is a tough one, I guess I'd keep quiet to spare her feelings, but she should know better than to buy personal care items without any consultation on the matter.

I would send it to a pro to see if it could be saved and make EVERY possible effort to get it shaving even if it's only once :) (Prob drop 200 bucks trying to fix it LOL)

Tough question. If the razor really isn't capable of being used then I'd probably look at putting another blade in the same scales so it would look the same but it was usable but not tell her.

If my wife had "hunted for days for the perfect gift" for me, and it turned out unusable, I would tell her it was so good that I was going to display it instead of shaving with it because it was just flat too good to shave with. A shave lasts a day. Most marriages should last longer than that.

My parents gave me two completely unuseable straights for Christmas. I was the happiest person in the room I think. A W&B true full wedge with the "You lather well, I'll shave well" etch, and a Genco frenchpoint. They were in a box with a Bill Ellis restoration cd. What a great day! Neither was sub par of course, just pretty ugly right now. I thought it was the best gift ever!

I like the "replace the blade" idea. The "display" idea is really good too. The "marriages" comment is right on too. My first marriage shouldn't have even lasted as long as a shave, but I have a wonderful son in my life now, as well as the woman of my dreams. I would much rather keep her, and my face intact. :) I would probably go with the "display" route. Now she knows though, because she's reading over my shoulder, if I ever display a razor she gets me that I'm not happy with it. (she laughed as she read this) I told you she was great.
Joe, I would rather get a fix-r-upper than the Gold Dollar I had envisioned when this thought hopped through my mind.

I have a Durham Duplex from 4 years ago without even the blade lock, so it is really useless, she tried though...

I explained it to her that people selling these things in the antique stores have no clue what they are talking about, and that if she ever wants to buy me another blade to please E-mail either Lynn, Max or Gugi before she buys anything :)

I do still however have the Durham and some day I might put it all back together just to try it :p

I'm too honest. I'd probably tell her it was crap, but thank her deeply for her thoughtfulness because it is the thought that counts.

That probably means that one should smile sweetly and look excited, then out of site discard the blade and claim you lost it. :D