You people and your new-fangled toys.
Try shavin' with this!
Posted on 02/14/2006 10:04:07 PM PST by nickcarraway
I have gone AWOL in the blade wars.
My desertion happened when I noticed that Gillette had issued Fusion, a razor with five, yes five, blades. This is in response to Schick's Quattro four-blade razor, which itself was a response to Gillette's three-blade Mach3 and Mach3Turbo, which uses a battery to make the razor vibrate and followed the Gillette two-blade Sensor, which was in competition with Schick's...
But enough. I am a Christian conservative Republican who believes in profits and free markets -- but I also know what planned obsolescence and scams are. And the shaving wars have been enough to (almost) turn me Marxist. Like poorly made shoes that fall apart after six month, bad pop music that sells zillions of CDs and then fades forever, and American cars that spend most of the time in the shop, modern razors are forever being repackaged as new, improved, dynamic, fresh, indispensable. It's one of the world's biggest scams.
The world's best razors were made over a hundred years ago, and there was no reason to change them. Men once went to the barber for a shave until, in the late 1800s, the safety razor arrived. The safety razor was a thing of beauty, an indestructible chrome weapon that sat snugly in the hand. Replacement blades were pennies for a dozen. Then something very sinister happened. In 1895 barber King Camp Gillette -- yes, that was his real name -- figured that he could make millions by marketing a disposable razor. The razor wouldn't shave any better than the safety razor -- in fact, it would be considerably worse -- but what difference did that make? There were holdouts, however. I remember seeing a safety razor in my grandfather's house, and my oldest brother used one well into the early 1970s. I remember knowing what the thing was but having no idea how it worked, and even thinking it a little strange. Thus was the feminization of American culture given another small push.
But by the time I began shaving in the early 1980s, the game was over. The art of shaving became the specialty of a few old barbers. This was depicted wonderfully in the movie Barber Shop. A young "hair stylist" is attempting to shave a customer, but handles his head like a boy playing with a Tonka truck. The old barber, played by Cedric the Entertainer, seizes the tools from the youngster and takes over. Shaving is an art, he explains. It's about quality, excellence, the masculinity of proper grooming. "When I'm done his face will be as smooth as Gary Coleman," he jokes. The younger barbers gather around, mesmerized by the "old school" method.
It's time to relearn that method. When I heard that Gillette was escalating, I went online and ordered an arsenal of old-school shaving supplies. I got a "classic" safety razor from Merkur, a German company that's been in the business for over a century. Then I ordered a genuine badger hair shaving brush and a tub of shaving cream from Truefitt and Hill, generally acknowledged as the world's first barbershop. Add to that after shave and an alum block, used to staunch nicks, and I was ready.
The reason I was ready for nicks and cuts is that several how-to shaving guides and websites warned that going from a disposable to a safety razor was like stepping up from a scooter to a BMW. Generations of girly-men had not used the proper stuff, and there would be a period of acclimation. It was like those primitive tribes that intentionally cut teenage boys to usher them into manhood.
That first day, I stepped out of the shower careful not to let my face dry. Old-school shaving is also called "wet" shaving, and the best way to do it is to keep your face as wet as possible. I picked up the Merkur. If you've spent most of your life using disposables or even the higher-end Sensors and Excels, the switch back to single-blade can be a real adjustment. For one thing, the razor is heavier. With a decent safety razor you don't push the blade mush; you simple let it glide down the face. I tried to remember all I had learned from the websites: always shave with the direction hair grows; shaving against results in razor burn. Don't force the blade.
Yet like a black labrador puppy's instinct to swim, it came easily, like a vestigial organ kicking back to life. And yes, the first few times I did cut myself -- but not as badly I had feared. Indeed, I had damaged my face much worse in the past using cheap disposables. But soon I got the hang of it. I was shaving. I was shaving like a man. Suddenly the last 40 years faded away -- the flower boys of the 1960s, the sensitive men of the 1970s, the androgynous pouters of the 1980s, the soft grungers of the 1990s -- and the crude, pseudo-masculine Maxim "lads" of today. This wasn't about the metrosexual goops and lotions of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, nor was it about the dumb, crude and sloppy man culture celebrated in beer -- and razor -- ads. It was about being a man, and a gentleman. It was about using the right tool for the job at hand. It was about those things that American manufacturers of everything from cars to clothes need to learn again: quality and excellence.
I believe in free markets and good businesses getting rich. Yet I also believe in quality that lasts, and that Americans are the best in the world at making thing if they put their minds to it. I hope that Gillette and Schick and whoever else wants to bring back American safety razors, and that they make millions of dollars and hire thousands of workers because of the popularity of said product. After all, there are certain things in this world that were done perfectly and cannot and should not be improved. Jesus lived a perfect life. The book is the ultimate form of conveying information. No one will sing "My Way" better than Sinatra. Michael Jordan was the best basketball player ever, period.
And the safety razor won't be improved upon. No matter how many blades they keep adding.
Mark Gauvreau Judge is the author of God and Man at Georgetown Prep: How I Became a Catholic Despite 20 Years of Catholic Schooling (Crossroad, 2005) and Damn Senators: My Grandfather and the Story of Washington's Only World Series Championship (Encounter, 2003).
I thought that smart-a$$ remark would show up alot sooner than the 90 posts it took you (-:
You people and your new-fangled toys.
Try shavin' with this!
A hairsuit sounds gorilla-like.
How do you feel about a hirsute male?
The only item more over marketed is the toothbrush.
Love is......
Remembering to take the blade off if you borrow your husband's razor.
My ex, actually, but yeah. Very nice. I wont date somebody (for long) who wont.
Well, some guys are rather more gorilla-like, than not. LOL
Don't like hirsute ones either. :-)
The following is somewhat Generation X....But back in the early 90s there was a popular cartoon on MTV called 'Beavis and Butthead' which was a story about two juvenile idiots. In a particular episode or two, when the task at hand would get too difficult for them, the one character Beavis, would assume his alter ego "The Great Cornholio," indicated by the shirt pulled over his head..He would then would walk around harrassing people, telling them "I am the great Cornholio, I need TP for my bunghole" and "I am Cornholio...Are you threatening me??"
It's just stupid sillyness, but the cartoon was rather popular...Google "Cornholio" in the image section og google and you will get photos of hundreds of people with shirts pulled over their heads. Apparently someone put John Kerry's on the photo I posted erlier...not the two ears of corn in his hands in that photo. Here is a picture of the actual cartoon character...
No, actually I don't "like it" at all.
I intend to- 'til death do us part.
Hairy? Not particularly- she has hair where she's supposed to. Because she doesn't shave the hair on her legs, it's extremely fine and soft- in summer when she's tan and it's chlorine-bleached it's invisible.
Wide hips? Yes- but she has the shoulders to match, so she's got nice proportions.
Pot belly? Only when she's pregnant. My lady is near the top of the acceptable body fat % range for females, but not over it.
http://www.healthchecksystems.com/bodyfat.htm
(For reference, her lean body mass is 165#- not kidding! She had it tested.)
Tiny breasts? Well, for a woman who's 5'10", with long legs and broad shoulders, I suppose 34C is on the small side.
Picture an older Lucy Lawless as a country housewife, and you're pretty close.
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