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May 2021 Gentlemanly Restraint Until Month End (GRUME)

Finds like that are hard to pass up. That's why I don't go into antique stores anymore! Well, that...and most of them closed due to COVID. :(

Please feel free to play along from home, and we'll hope to see you next month. And listen to Owen Bawn!

And when a brother falls, it's time for...

Roll Call!

1) @FoolishMortal
2) @Doti B
3) @MtView
4) @wmadoty
5) @Herrenberg
6) @La Malice
7) @cryhavoc - GRUYERE
8) @henrickd - GRUYERE
9) Heavy_Metal_Hound - out (5/9: Ever Ready SE razor)
10) @Roedeer
11) @Chef455
12) @Jmp63 - GRUYERE
13) @Owen Bawn
14) @Contact_vs_Feedback - GRUYERE
15) @Schnitzel52
16) @‘Bout Time
17) @AZBronco
18) @Cahoots
19) @SeinfeldNoir
20) @tjsgarden
21) @pdieten - GRUYERE
22) @Timeclo
23) @Kyle89
24) @Sinnbad11
25) @Cino
26) @redrako
27) Sandorfi - out (5/3: Soaps and aftershaves)
28) @SharpieB
29) @Sotiris_A
30) @Tomo
31) @FL shaver
32) @linty1
Still in
 
I've been working on a partly used stick of Arko lately, and that is good soap that I have no problem with, but my relationship with Shark blades is such that there is no way in everloving h e double hockey sticks that I'm breaking GRUYERE just to buy some even if it does rhyme.

If we're really lucky I might be willing to load one of my excess of Silver Star blades, but that's as far as I go. Arko-Starko. Done.

PM me your address and I will send you a few Shark Super Stainless blades so you can give them a try.
 
If you are willing to extend that same courtesy to your pal here in WNC I'd be down for joining you. I have a couple of sticks of Arko (never used it before) but no Sharks and I'm in the 4 month sabbatical. A single tuck should do me for a months worth of shaves no problem. I typically shave for one week on a single blade ;)
PM me your address and I wlll send you some Shark Super Stainless blades. Had a fellow B&B'er do this for me with Astra Superior Platinum's.
 
Still in

Prep : hot shower / Bulldog original face wash
Pre shave : Proraso white
Brush : Proraso boar by Omega
Cream : Proraso white in a tube
Razor : Merkur 34 C
Blade : Battle Brother Shaving Co (1)
Post : alum block and then Proraso White after shave balm

Result :

not sharp, not smooth, sometimes tuggy. some nick on each pass and plenty of alum feedback.
 
Still in

Prep : hot shower / Bulldog original face wash
Pre shave : Proraso white
Brush : Proraso boar by Omega
Cream : Proraso white in a tube
Razor : Merkur 34 C
Blade : Battle Brother Shaving Co (1)
Post : alum block and then Proraso White after shave balm

Result :

not sharp, not smooth, sometimes tuggy. some nick on each pass and plenty of alum feedback.

I never had good luck with those blades either.
 
Still in.

After I pressed the Eject button on the April GRUME, I went a little nuts with the purchases. I have a nice rationalization, though. It goes like this: I discovered, during my first restraint period ever, that I was not quite where I wanted to be with my shave gear. So I after my failure of restraint, I scrambled and made purchases to bring me up to ready, a place from which GRUME success is far more likely.

How do you like that one? Sounds farfetched, even to my ears, when I write it out like that, but I have a strong reason to believe it might actually be true: it's exactly how I've behaved with other hobbies. Once I have my hands on the stuff that has me in the place I want to be, further temptations become a weak, feeble thing, and I just don't buy much. Why shouldn't it happen with this hobby, too?

Exhibit A in "a little nuts with the purchases" is the brush I used for the first time today.
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I had two SV shave soaps on hand, and wanted to try a couple of others, and it turns out SV sells brushes, and...

I was actually stunned by how great this brush is. It feels great in the hand. It seems to push all my buttons, the right skritch, the right backbone, and a readiness to produce a rich lather that had me actually laughing with joy for a moment. Maybe it's optimized for their soap. Love how it looks, too.

The SV Cosmo soap was part of the same order. I loved Desert Vetiver so much that I wanted to try some others. The Cosmo is not like anything I've ever smelled in a soap. It reminded me of the salty, minerally aroma you smell at a Florida beach that is absolutely littered with seashells. I like it a lot. I live in a desert, but it makes me feel as though I live in a beach house.

The razor has an interesting back story. I've told it in full on my intro thread, so I'll sketch it here. It's an Iwasaki Tamahagane that I bought on eBay. When it arrived, and I saw the back side looking like that, except less shiny, I thought I'd been ripped off, sold a pig in a poke in the form of a used-up razor. But I finally learned that such razors have plenty of life left, and can be honed, and I went at it. It's now my favorite razor. The heavy use it saw before it got to me might actually have helped with that, making the razor a touch less tall, and a bit more acute in angle. Maybe it also helped that I had to use about a zillion strokes to get a bevel, since there was so much metal touching the stone, so it got a ton of polishing. I've since learned how to open up more hollow, but on this one, it was pure repetition. It's maneuverable, super super sharp, and you can feel the hairs cut with the feedback through the handle. Using it feels like I am in total control, and I could make it do absolutely anything.
 
I quite literally have several thousand dollars worth of shaving brushes. Yes, I'm in 'restraint' in that I'm not purchasing anything new and I'm choosing not to use a brush that knocked me out of a GRUME, but believe me, there's nothing ascetic about my restraint. I'm using the best shaving brushes in the world, and I have plenty of them.

This past Feb-early April I decided only to use pure badger bushes for Lent. They aren't exactly a cilice or a flagellum or a hair shirt but a pure brush does inflict a wee modicum of discomfort on the user. But my 5 pure badgers are all either Rooneys or Simpsons; in other words, even when I practice asceticism I do so in luxury.

Don't cry for me, Argentina...

A tip of the hat, Owen, for being true to GRUME. Although I
Even after reading B&B for years, whenever I see the word "tuck" I think of a hemorrhoid treatment, not razor blades.

There aren't too many other words that have multiple definitions that might be as life altering as Owen's aforementioned uses of the word "Tuck."

I'm in for Arko Thursday.
 
On The Tenth Day Of GRUME-ing...

Pre-shave: Shower and Cremo Lavender shave cream (it is slick!)
Feather AS-D2 with Nacet blade (3x)
D.R. Harris Lavender soap
Post shave: Aloe vera, Thayer Lavender WH; Lucky Tiger Face Tonic on hands and arms

Summary
I did it.
I finally paired the Feather razor with a Nacet blade. I have been having courtship difficulties with this razor. I am determined that the razor and I will have a good relationship. Every razor I combine with a Nacet works for me. The blade gets very good marks for comfort and efficiency. Anyway, the razor actually felt familiar and I knew when the blade was at the right angle. I am going to give "her" (the Feather) more opportunities to woo me with her charm. It was an excellent shave!
I AM IN FOR ARKO THURSDAY.

Good Day :letterk1:
 
I am out. 👎

i have been waiting for a RazoRock Game Changer .84-P plate to come back into stock at Italian Barber for ages and I got the email notification last night. Ordered. And yet again... down in GRUME flames I go.

Don’t cry for me, fellas. I am good with this purchase and buying a $30 razor plate isn’t gonna open the floodgates. I won’t be calling Mark at Simpsons to commission a new custom brush. 🙂

See you in June.
 
I am out. 👎

i have been waiting for a RazoRock Game Changer .84-P plate to come back into stock at Italian Barber for ages and I got the email notification last night. Ordered. And yet again... down in GRUME flames I go.

Don’t cry for me, fellas. I am good with this purchase and buying a $30 razor plate isn’t gonna open the floodgates. I won’t be calling Mark at Simpsons to commission a new custom brush. 🙂

See you in June.

It's a great razor. You're going to enjoy it.
 
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