what i have learned about shaving

yesterday a coworker acquaintance asked if i was still blogging. i said i was but that it'd gotten really boring. he said it had always been boring. ouch!

with that in mind, i bring you a really boring post about what i've learned about shaving these last several months, during which i've been really obsessive about exploring the (dare i say) art.

two things have become very apparent most recently, in the last week:

1) my face likes really sharp blades. feathers and swedish gillettes.
2) my face likes tallow. tabac is the cheap tallow choice, harris is the pricier tallow soap. both produce an exceptionally close shave when combined with a sharp blade.

i've also learned that my favorite safety razor is the one i started out with, the merkur classic. i've tried two different slants and a HD classic, but i enjoy the plain old classic the most, and with the right blade and soap i get fine results.

soap aroma turned out to surprise me. the soaps that i enjoy smelling are not necessarily what i thought i'd like. when i began the current obsession i was mostly interested in lime and sweet almond. now, i like the woodsy ones. today was harris 'marlbrough' and castle forbes 'cedarwood sandalwood'. i smell like a tree, a very nice tree. but not a lime tree.