Like many, perhaps most, I turned to wet shaving for a variety of reasons. Practical reasons of not wanting to pay exorbitant prices for disposable crap being primary, but not exclusive. Another was the suspicion that shaving in the "old school way" was probably superior in any event. At first, the only thing I could say for sure was that wet shaving ended up being far less expensive than cartridge shaving. The shave quality was... meh. I did some research into techniques on many aspects of wet shaving and in the few years I've been doing this I've got my own methods that work. I started off with cheap parker TTO. Wife broke that and I got a Merkur progress which I gifted to a friend when I got the 34C. Shaved with the 34C almost exclusively for the better part of 3 years. In that time, the money I had saved by not buying cartridges had "paid for" itself and then some even considering the two other DEs I had gotten.
. . . Then suddenly . . .
The "almost exclusively" bit before was in direct reference to some straight razor shaving I had experimented with for a time. It's been about a year since I've touched my straights and the sight of the strops was starting to depress me. I decided to open up an eBay account and sell them. In doing research on listing and with the reality of losing these possessions I started feeling inexplicably conflicted with the notion of going through with the task. (see this play out here, if you're interested. In sum: I was waffling before, continued to waffle, did something totally unreasonable, and am no longer waffling.) I guess this was a few months ago now. Before that I had never really understood eBay. Suddenly I was hooked. Looking back on all that I have, this is unacceptable. It's time for a level head to prevail, so to speak. I'm not interested in collecting. I don't have AD
rolleyes1 ) I was simply taken in by the eBay process, which in retrospect isn't really a healthy thing I suppose.
My collection is listed below. In truth, this isn't that bad. My goal is to get back to just one, maybe two DEs.
Going to keep the injector. It's novel enough for me to feel ok about keeping it around. If I feel like trying another injector in the future I will get rid of this one, but until then it can stay.
First I'm going to decide on the non-adjustable DEs. This is mostly a tossup between the krona and the superspeed. I'm definitely getting rid of one of those two. I just need to decide which one I like more. Getting rid of the HD as well. I keep trying to come up with justifications to keep it, but can't come up with anything good. It's a beautiful razor. I think it's far more elegant than either the krona or flare tip, and I think the build quality is probably far greater. That said, the other two just shave better. At first I thought about the two vintage razors as some sort of old dependable car and the merkur was a fancier german model that wasn't bad but was more form over function. Now, there's nothing wrong with fancy cars. But this metaphor breaks down when you consider the primary function of a car like that is to be seen. If no one was around to see you, you'd go for the one that worked better and felt more comfortable. That said, I'm not in the habit of shaving in public so I see very little use in having a fancy razor for its own sake.
Between the adjustables, hands-down I'd keep the slim over the progress. I liked the progress for what it was, but there's a reason I gave it up for the HD.
I can live with having one non-adjustable and one adjustable. So in the short term it I'm looking at hanging onto (superspeed OR krona) and the slim. But over the next 6 months to a year if it ends up I only use one of them, I'll get rid of the other. I'm leaning towards the slim in that regard.
Don't get me wrong -- I love variety. But having multiple DEs just doesn't appeal to me really. I've got the injector and I've got a feather ac ss straight. Eventually I'll get another real straight. When I feel like changing things up, I'll really change them up. I might try other DEs in the future, but it will be at the expense of the one or two I've hung on to.
tl; dr: Decided Ive got too many safety razors. Keeping my injector. Choosing between the superspeed flare tip and krona and then comparing that winner to the slim.
. . . Then suddenly . . .
The "almost exclusively" bit before was in direct reference to some straight razor shaving I had experimented with for a time. It's been about a year since I've touched my straights and the sight of the strops was starting to depress me. I decided to open up an eBay account and sell them. In doing research on listing and with the reality of losing these possessions I started feeling inexplicably conflicted with the notion of going through with the task. (see this play out here, if you're interested. In sum: I was waffling before, continued to waffle, did something totally unreasonable, and am no longer waffling.) I guess this was a few months ago now. Before that I had never really understood eBay. Suddenly I was hooked. Looking back on all that I have, this is unacceptable. It's time for a level head to prevail, so to speak. I'm not interested in collecting. I don't have AD
rolleyes1 ) I was simply taken in by the eBay process, which in retrospect isn't really a healthy thing I suppose.My collection is listed below. In truth, this isn't that bad. My goal is to get back to just one, maybe two DEs.
- Merkur Progress
- Merkur 34C HD
- Superspeed flare tip
- Slim
- Schick injector
- Schick Krona
Going to keep the injector. It's novel enough for me to feel ok about keeping it around. If I feel like trying another injector in the future I will get rid of this one, but until then it can stay.
First I'm going to decide on the non-adjustable DEs. This is mostly a tossup between the krona and the superspeed. I'm definitely getting rid of one of those two. I just need to decide which one I like more. Getting rid of the HD as well. I keep trying to come up with justifications to keep it, but can't come up with anything good. It's a beautiful razor. I think it's far more elegant than either the krona or flare tip, and I think the build quality is probably far greater. That said, the other two just shave better. At first I thought about the two vintage razors as some sort of old dependable car and the merkur was a fancier german model that wasn't bad but was more form over function. Now, there's nothing wrong with fancy cars. But this metaphor breaks down when you consider the primary function of a car like that is to be seen. If no one was around to see you, you'd go for the one that worked better and felt more comfortable. That said, I'm not in the habit of shaving in public so I see very little use in having a fancy razor for its own sake.
Between the adjustables, hands-down I'd keep the slim over the progress. I liked the progress for what it was, but there's a reason I gave it up for the HD.
I can live with having one non-adjustable and one adjustable. So in the short term it I'm looking at hanging onto (superspeed OR krona) and the slim. But over the next 6 months to a year if it ends up I only use one of them, I'll get rid of the other. I'm leaning towards the slim in that regard.
Don't get me wrong -- I love variety. But having multiple DEs just doesn't appeal to me really. I've got the injector and I've got a feather ac ss straight. Eventually I'll get another real straight. When I feel like changing things up, I'll really change them up. I might try other DEs in the future, but it will be at the expense of the one or two I've hung on to.
tl; dr: Decided Ive got too many safety razors. Keeping my injector. Choosing between the superspeed flare tip and krona and then comparing that winner to the slim.
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