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5 Years on the DE/Straight path - My Observations

Hi all,

Not looking for a debate or anything but I wanted to share a lot of observations I have had in the last 4-5 years I have left the electric razor and gone to safety and straight razor shaving. It's a bit of an epiphany I have had due to few a crunch weeks where my shaving took a turn and led me to form some interesting opinions...

With that in mind, my story unfolds...

1977 - Time to start shaving - Mom buys me a Gillette Track II and some Gillette red can foam and off I go. No one ever shows me how ro shave. Terrible shaves for years until I decide to go to a foil razor mid 1990's and had wonderful close shaves...

2013 - Buddy talks me into trying a safety razor using a nice brush and soap - The whole enchilada. "You'll save so much money, enjoy your shaves and have the best shaves ever!" he says with glee! So I pickup a Merkur 34C HD, some Prorasso cream, a bottle of Pinaud and an assortment of sample blades and a nice Edwin Jagger Best Badger brush. While waiting for the order I watch tons of YouTube to figure out what to do (Mantic. Geo etc.) - Here I learned something no one EVER told me (and is key to my story): Map your beard, and beard reduction with multiple passes.

So all my new fun stuff arrives, I prep, shave, and it's pretty darn nice! So I continue, and on the way I spend WAY more than I ever thought I would shaving (the head on my Braun gets replaced every year for $35 and I buy a 3 pack of Afta each year for $10) because now I have 3-4 creams/soaps, 5 aftershaves, 3 brushes, 2 Fat Boys, a Slim, a Variant, a Feather straight, a 50's straight and 6 Gems - Oh boy! I spent hundreds the first year alone and probably in the last 5 years over $700. LOL

Not complaining of cost in any way, but this needs to be realized when you tell someone how much money they CAN save if they don't let this evolve into a hobby - Because it is addictive and it probably will! ;)

Okay so fast forward now to a few months ago when I was moving - Due to scheduling issues we literally lived in the sun room of our house while all the floors were redone and we were living out of boxes - So all my shaving supplies were tucked away but well - I needed to shave and go to work! What did we as a family have easily available? A bag of Gillette Custom Plus3 Disposable Razors from Costco and the Gillette Fusion ProGlide 2-in-1 Shave Gel that my wife and daughter use to shave their legs. I thought uh-oh here we go but a man has to do what a man has to do!

So what happened? Well, for two weeks I surprisingly (to me) had absolutely wonderful shaves without issue - And I attribute this to one fact - In my younger years I was shaving all wrong - No one ever taught me - Now I had the most important shaving tool of all at my fingertips: Knowledge of my beard growth by mapping it, and beard reduction.

Now that was a few months ago, and I of course went back to my safety and straight razors because it is enjoyable. But last week, just for giggles, I wanted to see if I could have a repeat experience so I went back to the 65 cent Gillette razor and gel. Another week and a half of perfectly comfortable and damn fine shaves (nice and quick being a bonus as well).

So anyhow - I remain convinced that for me, and probably many others, there are a lot of tools to shave your beard with - They all work well if you know the fundamentals!

Oh and one other thing I came to realize - You know how the multi-blade cartridges pull a bit whereas you can't feel anything like that with a nice DE blade? It may be because you are pulling 3+ blades through hair instead of one - Just my thoughts because second and third passes there is no pull at all; so maybe it's that first one attacking the longest hair. Just a thought because if I shave twice in a day (sometimes again at night for a get-together or special occasion) there is no pull whatsoever on that first pass.

Anyhow thanks for the read and shave on friends! Whatever you use! Because it is still wet shaving! I think! :)
 
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