Most guys who get into wetshaving do it solely for the quality of the shave. I'm one of these guys -- I hated the shaves I was getting with modern cartridge razors and goo-inna-can, so I tried a bunch of stuff, both moderne (Kiehl's and Aramis Lab Series shaving creams) and old-school (DE razors and traditional English shaving cream), until I hit upon a rig that gave me closer and more comfortable shaves, less irritation, and a greater sense of olfactory pleasure than what you get from Gillette Foamy.
Then there are what I call "shavegeeks". These are the guys who clog the online wetshaving forums and obsess over every aspect of the routine EXCEPT the quality of the shave. To the shavegeeks, everything about shaving is a competition -- which razor ROCKZ, which cream RULEZ, which brush DOMINATES. And there's nothing that typifies the shavegeek mentality more than the stupefying amount of discussion devoted to just how much sheer cubic footage of lather a given shaving cream or soap, or combination thereof, will produce if you mix it all up in a large sized cereal bowl.
Yes, I said a cereal bowl. Right now, there are guys out there whipping up huge mounds of shaving lather in a bowl just like Julia Child used to beat a dozen eggs to make a souffle. I'm not making this up. Just picturing it gives me the willies.
Let's get one thing straight here. If you dunk any decent shaving brush (which means it's made of boar or badger hair and you paid more than ten bucks for it) into a sink of hot water to get it wet, then either swirl it over the top of a hard shaving soap for ten seconds or dip its wet tips into a tub of shaving cream and then swirl the brush around in your other hand's open palm for ten seconds, you will get more than enough perfect shaving lather every time. This is the single easiest move in the entire wetshaving canon. Barely sentient beings do it routinely. It's so not a big deal.
But apparently, it is for the shavegeeks. Go onto the shaving discussion sites and you'll see lazy newbies whining about how they can't get decent lather from this soap or that cream, and then other shavegeeks will chime in with "I used to have the same problem as you, fella, until I started using....a BOWL!"
Here's why: because when you use a bowl instead of the palm of your hand or, even better, a mug, all that extra room means your lather will explode into huge mounds of thick, rich, meringue-like peaks of fluffy white goodness. A dab of shaving cream the size of a quarter and a soaking wet shaving brush will whip up so much lather in a cereal bowl that you'll have enough to shave ten or twenty guys easy.
And this is cool why?
If building up lather in the palm of your hand creates more thick, perfect lather than you could possibly use up in one shave even if you do three or four entire passes, why would you need to make more, unless you somehow equate big gobs of lather with being a big man, etc.? Maybe to a shavegeek, lather = ejaculate, so the more the manlier, etc? But unless you're a horse trying to inseminate another horse, I'm not certain that twenty times the normal amount of ejaculate is a good thing, for anybody involved. Maybe I'm old-fashioned when it comes to this stuff.
I used the bowl method this morning, just to underline my astonishment at this shavegeek fad. I soaked my Vulfix #2235 badger brush in a sink of hot water like I usually do, and I swirled the tips over the top of a tub of Trumper's Violet cream like I usually do, but instead of making the lather in my palm, I beat the brush around and around in the bowl for a good ten, fifteen seconds.
Oh, I got lather. Did I ever. Tons of it. A ridiculous amount. Secretariat couldn't work up this much lather. It was thick, rich, glistening, you name it -- all the good things you want shaving lather to be for the best shave. But it was a disgusting waste. I used maybe a twentieth of the lather in the bowl to shave thrice -- down, up, and once more under the chin -- and then had to dump the rest of the lather into the sink. All that prime, high-end lather, just poured down the drain.
Seriously, if you need to use a bowl to make good usable lather, something's wrong with you. You probably shouldn't be shaving this way. Do you need to use a saw to open an envelope? I just don't understand the shavegeek's obsession with the bowl. It's beyond overkill, and for what?? To Make Lather. Which anyone, even a small child, can easily do just as quickly and easily in the palm of their hand or, if you prefer to keep your hands clean, a mug.
The really gone shavegeeks engage in a lot of embarrassing behavior that makes me shake my head sadly. But so far, their elevation of the cereal bowl to the shavegeek pantheon of accessories to obsess over and titter about like old ladies at a quilting bee -- "Look at the JPG I just posted of my new bowl I bought!" "Wow, where can I get a bowl exactly like that, it's so KEWL! How does it compare latherwise with your other bowls?" -- is the single biggest reason I wonder, late at night when I can't sleep, whether being as interested as I am about shaving automatically makes me a loser.
Then there are what I call "shavegeeks". These are the guys who clog the online wetshaving forums and obsess over every aspect of the routine EXCEPT the quality of the shave. To the shavegeeks, everything about shaving is a competition -- which razor ROCKZ, which cream RULEZ, which brush DOMINATES. And there's nothing that typifies the shavegeek mentality more than the stupefying amount of discussion devoted to just how much sheer cubic footage of lather a given shaving cream or soap, or combination thereof, will produce if you mix it all up in a large sized cereal bowl.
Yes, I said a cereal bowl. Right now, there are guys out there whipping up huge mounds of shaving lather in a bowl just like Julia Child used to beat a dozen eggs to make a souffle. I'm not making this up. Just picturing it gives me the willies.
Let's get one thing straight here. If you dunk any decent shaving brush (which means it's made of boar or badger hair and you paid more than ten bucks for it) into a sink of hot water to get it wet, then either swirl it over the top of a hard shaving soap for ten seconds or dip its wet tips into a tub of shaving cream and then swirl the brush around in your other hand's open palm for ten seconds, you will get more than enough perfect shaving lather every time. This is the single easiest move in the entire wetshaving canon. Barely sentient beings do it routinely. It's so not a big deal.
But apparently, it is for the shavegeeks. Go onto the shaving discussion sites and you'll see lazy newbies whining about how they can't get decent lather from this soap or that cream, and then other shavegeeks will chime in with "I used to have the same problem as you, fella, until I started using....a BOWL!"
Here's why: because when you use a bowl instead of the palm of your hand or, even better, a mug, all that extra room means your lather will explode into huge mounds of thick, rich, meringue-like peaks of fluffy white goodness. A dab of shaving cream the size of a quarter and a soaking wet shaving brush will whip up so much lather in a cereal bowl that you'll have enough to shave ten or twenty guys easy.
And this is cool why?
If building up lather in the palm of your hand creates more thick, perfect lather than you could possibly use up in one shave even if you do three or four entire passes, why would you need to make more, unless you somehow equate big gobs of lather with being a big man, etc.? Maybe to a shavegeek, lather = ejaculate, so the more the manlier, etc? But unless you're a horse trying to inseminate another horse, I'm not certain that twenty times the normal amount of ejaculate is a good thing, for anybody involved. Maybe I'm old-fashioned when it comes to this stuff.
I used the bowl method this morning, just to underline my astonishment at this shavegeek fad. I soaked my Vulfix #2235 badger brush in a sink of hot water like I usually do, and I swirled the tips over the top of a tub of Trumper's Violet cream like I usually do, but instead of making the lather in my palm, I beat the brush around and around in the bowl for a good ten, fifteen seconds.
Oh, I got lather. Did I ever. Tons of it. A ridiculous amount. Secretariat couldn't work up this much lather. It was thick, rich, glistening, you name it -- all the good things you want shaving lather to be for the best shave. But it was a disgusting waste. I used maybe a twentieth of the lather in the bowl to shave thrice -- down, up, and once more under the chin -- and then had to dump the rest of the lather into the sink. All that prime, high-end lather, just poured down the drain.
Seriously, if you need to use a bowl to make good usable lather, something's wrong with you. You probably shouldn't be shaving this way. Do you need to use a saw to open an envelope? I just don't understand the shavegeek's obsession with the bowl. It's beyond overkill, and for what?? To Make Lather. Which anyone, even a small child, can easily do just as quickly and easily in the palm of their hand or, if you prefer to keep your hands clean, a mug.
The really gone shavegeeks engage in a lot of embarrassing behavior that makes me shake my head sadly. But so far, their elevation of the cereal bowl to the shavegeek pantheon of accessories to obsess over and titter about like old ladies at a quilting bee -- "Look at the JPG I just posted of my new bowl I bought!" "Wow, where can I get a bowl exactly like that, it's so KEWL! How does it compare latherwise with your other bowls?" -- is the single biggest reason I wonder, late at night when I can't sleep, whether being as interested as I am about shaving automatically makes me a loser.
