Norsemans shave diary

I would have to say the big metro cities in America are expensive. As mentioned in here NYC and Chicago both. But it also has a huge impact on the residents. Some states, residents are saying farewell and moving elsewhere because they can no longer afford to live there. New Jersey comes to mind. Most taxes in WV seem to be relatively fair, with nothing being insanely high.

 

Wow, Norway is definitely richer than Sweden, because Sweden ain't got nothing, practically!

 

America outside of the major cities is pretty reasonable. Of course Illinois is probably the worst state in the union and I can't wait to move out of here.

 

I am far from any economist, and not that bright so my "analysis" might be way off , but the Norwegian economy is doing very well. Unemployment is 2-3%, housing is record high and most Norwegians are living pretty good lives.
The Swedish economy, like most European countries, are not doing so quite so good. And a lot of the Swedish youth have travelled to Norway to find work.

But the reason for our good fortune is the oil. We have lots of oil, and some fish. And that’s about it.
The Swedes on the other hand, have their ingenuity, sense for business and are pretty resourceful overall. But the global economy being what it is, has also had an impact on their economy.
They are one of the few countries that make their own fighter jets, they own Volvo, Ikea, H&M and used to own Saab.
I will never admit it to them, but I like the swedes. They are hard working and clever and last but not least, their women are beautiful.

It goes rather well, I think.
The soap has expanded to fit the puck, but I still have cracks on the surface of the soap. But that’s not a big deal.
I will give it a go sometimes this week and see how it lathers up. Never had a problem lathering it, it has just felt dry on my face.
Looking forward to it J

 

Monday – 18-09-2012

Been busy with work and life, so I am a bit behind on my writing, but here goes:

It was Monday morning and I loaded up two Merkur HD razors with two different blades.
The blades are Shark Super Stainless and Astra Superior Stainless, and I do not know in which razor they are loaded.
On the right whisker, I used a blue labeled razor, and on my left I used a red one.

I had not shaved for approx. 36 hours, and had a decent amount of stubble.
The cream of choice was The Body Shop Maca Root Cream, and I used a Omega Pure Badger brush to build lather. No prep cream or oil, just a face wash.

It was a three pass shave. 2 x WTG and 1 x XTG.

The first pass gave me some trouble in form of tugging and resistance. Not very pleasant, but not uncomfortable either. It appears that the blades where not sufficiently sharp to make a clean cut.

The second pass went a lot better. It felt smooth and decent, and with a slight lead to the blue one.
Third pass was more of the same, but as always my left side needed some more work. This may or most like may not have anything to do with the blade.

Aftershave stung like crazy, but the result was a nice CCS.
Used the Nivea Sensitive Aftershave Balm, and all was good. At least for a few hours where I had to put on a new layer of TBS Face Protector to feel sufficiently moisturized

However, as I write this a few hours later, I have noticed a slight sore feeling on my skin. Not much, but enough to notice a difference. The above mentioned TBS cream did also help with this, but not much.

Tonight is a new shave, and this time I will change sides

Tools:

FaceWash: TBD Facewash
Razor: 2 x Merkur 34 HD
Blade: Astra Blue and Shark SS
Cream: TBS Maca Root
Pre-shave: Njet
Brush: Omega Pure Badger
Rinse
Aftershave Lotion: Proraso AS Lotion
Aftershave Balm: Nivea Sensitive AS Balm

 

I'll give it a few more days.
Did a test lather before my SOS today, and it felt pretty good. But after a few minutes on my face, it started to evaporate, if I can call it that.
Not as bad as some other soaps I have seen, but I can not remember that it did this before. I guess only time will show

 

Wednesday - 19.09.2012

Second shave with the Blue Astra and the Shark SS blade.

I wanted to use some of my T&H samples, and chose the rose scented cream and a West Indies Lime Aftershave Balm. The small satchels contains enough products for two, maybe three shaves. I'll settle for two.

The shave consisted of four passes. 2 x WTG and 2 x XTG.
The blue labelled razor was set to attack my left side, and I started with the red on my right side.
The first thing I noticed was the same tugging and resistance as I experienced last time, but it felt slightly better/smoother(?)
The blue razor on the other hand, was much better. Still some tugging, but not nearly as bad as the red one.

The second and third pass was equal for both. Except for a few nicks on my left side, it felt nice and easy. But as always, I had a closer shave on my right side, and because of that I decided to go for a full fourth pass to even out the results.

Starting this pass, I noticed a slight tingling and I was afraid I was overdoing it. But the feeling disappeared and I continued in good concience. With this one I went XTG but started from the opposite direction. Slightly nervous, and tried switching hands for a more controlled shaving, but without much success.
The result was nonetheless a damn fine shave.

I rinsed off with cold water, applied some Proraso AS splash followed by T&H AS Balm.
As I write this half an our later, I will probably have to apply some more cream. Probably the Nivea porridge from the tin box. Always a safe choice

Tools:
Facewash: Musgo Glycerine Soap
Razor: 2 x Merkur HD
Blade: Astra Blue and Shark SS
Brush: Muhle Silvertip Badger
Crem: Truefitt & Hill Rose scented cream
AS Lotion: Prorasos Green
AS balm: Truefitt & Hill West Indian Limes AS Balm

 

Thursday – 20.09.2012

Third shave with my Shark SS and Blue Astra testing.
Contrary to the other two tries, I only had one day worth of stubble.
For lather I used what was left of the T&H Rose scented sample and managed to whip up a good one.

The first pass with the red one was same as before. It still tugged and felt like I was using a cartridge on a three day growth.
The blue one, was much better. Still some tugging, but in a completely different league than the red one.
But both experiences surprised me. I have used the Shark and been happy with its performance before. And although the blue Astra was new, I expected more. This being Astra and all, and me having the green version as a personal favorite I assumed it would be similar in performance.

Anyway, the second pass was obviously better. Still some issues with the red. It felt crude and raw on my face, while the blue was quite the opposite. This one felt smooth and dandy.
It also gave me a closer shave. But that might also be because I always get a closer shave on my right side.

Third pass was more of the same. Red felt raw, while the blue felt smooth.
My left side looked almost unshaven, while my right side was DFS. And I cannot blame all on my lack of “ambidextrous technical skill”

Therefore I went for a forth pass on the red side. It helped, but never managed to catch up.
Time to end it, I think.

Tools:
Facewash: Musgo Glycerine Soap
Razor: 2 x Merkur HD
Blade: Astra Blue and Shark SS
Brush: Frank Shaving Finest Badger
Cream: Truefitt & Hill Rose scented cream
AS Lotion: L’Occitane Aftershave
AS balm: Truefitt & Hill West Indian Limes AS Balm

 

Saturday - 22.09.2012

I havent had time to shave for a few days now, so it felt good to freshen up a bit this evening.
Two new blades to test and both from an Italian brand, but made in Germany. Or so I have been told.

The blades are Bolzano and Elios. And from what I have read they are supposed to be similar and with a good reputation.

As last time, I have two Merkur HD razors. Labelled with blue and red colours.
I have loaded the razors myself, but blindfolded. An interesting task, but thankfully without any casualties or bloodloss. (knocking on wood while typing this)

I used TSD Wheat Cream for lathering, and my FS Finest Badger Brush to build this fine piece of creamy goodness. At least it looked fine. On my face I noticed a burning sensation. Not strong enough to be painful, but enough to make its presence known.
Since this cream is sandalwood scented, I am wondering if I have caught the infamous sandalwood face burning flu.
It has been known to cause allergic reactions. Especially to those who just read about it, and was stupid enough to boldly proclaim immunity to this affliction.

Well I couldn't let this stop me, and proceeded with the shave. I had the usual three pass shave. 2 x WTG and 1 x XTG
Red on one my right side and blue on the remaining side.

First pass started with red, and as usual it did not feel particularly smooth. It tugged and was not what you might call pleasant. But I am starting to wonder if this might be how it is supposed to feel. I reckon I have semi though beard with a semi fast growth.
The blue razor felt noticiably worse. My first experience where I immediately can feel the difference between two blades. It was almost as there where no lather present at all. Not quite, but almost. I also discovered a small nick on the red side. But I think the lather closed it

Second Pass was different. Here I could hardly feel the effect of Red at all. It was smooth sailing and it cut like butter through a hot knife.
Blue was more noticable. Here I could clearly feel and hear the razor cutting my stubble. And it did a fine job.

Third pass was more of the same. But slightly more feeling from the red side, and still more audio and video from blue side. Red also gave me a nasty cut on the upper lip. But that was more me being stupid, than red being crude.

All in all an interesting shave. As always I had a closer shave on my right side. But the difference was less pronounced than what it usually is.
So either blue is doing a better job than its predeccessors on the left side, or my technique is getting better.
Perhaps both?

Tools:

Facewash: Musgo Glycerine Soap
Razor: 2 x Merkur HD
Blade: Bolzano and Elios
Brush: FS Fines Badger
Crem: TSD Wheat Cream - Sandalwood
AS Lotion: Prorasos Green - Old Formula
AS balm: Prorasos Balm - Old Formula

 

Sunday – 23.09.2012

This is an older entry, but when time is tight there is no time to write.
I am a bad poet and something something know it.

It was my second shave using the “Italian” blades and I only had time to do two passes.

First pass was as always with the grain, and both razors tugged a bit. Blue still felt noticeable better, but not good enough to be called a pure pleasure.

Second pass was across the grain, and blue was still in the lead. Although on this pass I felt that both of them did a very good job. It felt smooth and comfy.

However, after I put on some aftershave lotion and then some balm a few minutes later my skin did not feel great. I used some more lotion, and that calmed me down a bit.
But the following day I still felt like my face had been roughed up just a bit.
As I write this on a Tuesday afternoon I feel back to normal again.
But I do not know if this was because of the blades, or my paranoia telling me that it was the Proraso Sandalwood cream I used on Sunday.

Never had any problem with sandalwood before, but then again. My exposure and experience has been limited.

Tools:

Facewash: Musgo Glycerine Soap
Razor: 2 x Merkur HD
Blade: Bolzano and Elios
Brush: FS Fines Badger
Crem: Proraso - Sandalwood
AS Lotion: Prorasos Green - Old Formula
AS balm: Prorasos Balm - Old Formula

 

Tuesday – 25.09.2012

My third shave using the Bolzano and Elios combo.
The soap and brush for the day was L’occitane and a horse brush from Bestshave.net.
Brand new brush and it smelled accordingly. It was also less dense than what I am used to, but for just a few dollars I do not have the right to complain or be dissatisfied.
And nor am I. The lather it produced was first class, and felt very nice on my skin.

I had a three pass shave. 2 x WTG and 1 x XTG.

First pass went surprisingly well. I had a two day stubble, and that usually means some tugging and noticeable resistance. This time I only experienced some light resistance, but part from that it felt very smooth. At least on the red razor.
The blue razor felt slightly less sharp, but not much.

Second pass was even better. Here I could hardly feel the blade from red at all. It was almost like I had no blade loaded at all. But the result told me otherwise. A very fine shave so far.
Blue was louder and sounded more rough, but without being so. Since blue was working my bad (left) side, I also tried to focus more on stretching/flattening my skin for a closer shave, and with a positive result.
After the second pass I had a very nice CCS on both sides.

The third pass was XTG and both razors performed admirably. And upped the result from a CCS to a very good DFS.

After the shave I had two weepers on my left side and one on my right side. But they closed up pretty fast.

Very happy with this shave.

The aftershave routine was Proraso AfterShave lotion and D.R. Harris AfterShave Milk.
It worked very well for a few hours, but my face felt rather dry after that.

Today I had to use two moisturizers after my wash to properly hydrate my face.
With the Nivea “paint” as the last one. But that did the trick.
Good stuff that one.


Tools:

Facewash: TBS Maca Root wash
Razor: 2 x Merkur HD
Blade: Bolzano and Elios
Brush: Horse brush
Soap: L’Occitane
AS Lotion: Prorasos Green – New one
AS balm: D.R. Harris Aftershave Milk

 

Busy days at the moment, with little time to scribble. But I did manage a quick draft:

Wednesday – 26.09.2012

Fourth shave with the German made Italians.
Natural Mike was the soap of choice, and the lather it created was more than decent.
It also had a nice discreet scent with a rather interesting fragrance.
However it felt a bit dry on my face, and in the same time was very thin on the second and third pass. But performance was adequate and any complain I could have made would probably be more because of me than the quality of the soap.

The first pass gave me the usual resistance, but without any tugging sensation.
Blue felt less sharp than red, but after this pass. I had a closer shave on my blue side.

The second and third pass was similar. Closer shave on my blue side, and the few weepers I received was all red J

To even out the result, I went for a fourth pass on the red side. But this also being my left side, it was sort of expected.
I really need to work on my technique and level the playing field as they say in CONUS land J


Facewash: TBS Maca Root wash
Razor: 2 x Merkur HD
Blade: Bolzano and Elios
Brush: Horse brush
Soap: Mikes Natural Soap
AS Lotion: Ogallalallalla Bay Rum
AS balm: Nivea Sensitive AS Balm



I think I need to clean/polish my razors

 

Monday – 01.10.2012

It’s been a while now. I have been rather busy with life, the universe and everything (not the book) and turned me into a temporary lurker.

I am currently at work and still busy. But since I do not take cigarette or coffee breaks I will try to squeeze in a few words when I have two available minutes.

I have had a few shaves since last time. They were decent enough, but I discovered that my biggest problem at the moment is building lather. I somehow make them too dry.
Furthermore I got kind of fed up by having a first pass that that always felt more rugged/rough than I think it should be.
I have not been entirely sure if this is due to the lather, the blades, technique or something else.
As a first effort to counter this I loaded my progress with a feather blade and set it to 1
It was also time to try my hydrated version of Mitchells Wool Fat. I want to give thanks to the esteemed PLANofMAN for his advice on this matter.

I built me some nice lather, although it did look a tad moist. But since my “instinct” always give me too dry lather, I decided to ignore it and see what happened.

The first thing I noticed when I started shaving, was absolutely nothing. No resistance, no tugging and a razor, blade and lather working in perfect harmony.
The blade cut through my two day beard as easy as a lightsabre cutting through Jar-Jar Binks.
A clean cut with a loud hi fi sound. It was wonderful, absolutely wonderful.

I had three lovely passes. Two WTG one XTG and was rewarded with a decent DFS.
I also had no nicks, cuts or burns. Despite the fact that I have a nasty habit of shaving over certain areas more than once without applying more lather.
I have been told that this is most unwise. But having never been an Obi-Wan I guess “unwiseness” is part of what I am

Facewash: TBS Maca Root wash
Razor: Merkur Progress
Blade: Feather
Brush: Proraso Boar
Soap: Mitchells Wool Fat
AS Lotion: Proraso Aftershave – New Formula
AS balm: L’Occitane - Cade

 

Tuesday - 02.10.2012

When the second day of October falls on a Tuesday, it is written that all true Norse wet shavers must choose Proraso, and Proraso only, when shaving on that particular day.
True story.
So to honour that day, I chose the green Proraso line and limited my choices to new formula only.

It was also the second shave using a feather in my Merkur Progress. I started out with the setting on 2, but something told me that you are not allowed to do that on a
"proraso Tuesday", so I set it back to 1.5.

This second shave did not give me the same feeling of joy as the last one. Obviously with only 24 hours since my last shave, I had less hair to shave off. But I am not sure
if that was it.
Still, the blade did a pretty good job and removed all my facial hair in a satisfying matter. I did get a few cuts, but as always that was my own fault. I stretched my skin
on the left side of my jaw to such an extent that I knew I was heading for trouble and was about to cut myself. And two second later I did.
Did I mention that I am probably not that bright?
But the result was still a DFS - or perhaps a CCS+.
A little bit AS splash later, followed by Prorasos blue as balm (smells like an old damp cellar) and my face felt surprisingly good.

Tools:

Face Wash: Zirh Clean
Razor: Merkur Progress
Blade: Feather, 2nd shave
Brush: Proraso
Soap - Proraso new formulated green stuff
AS Lotion: Prorasos Green - new formula
AS balm: Prorasos Aloe Vera/Blue Balm

 

Thursday - 04.10.2012

I had initially planned on using the feather/progress combo for a third time. But then the postman was nice enough to deliver me an EJ DE89 coming all the way from Ireland. And in record time I might add.
The temptation proved too great and I just had to try it. I also wanted to try another one of the famous 7 o'Clock blades, and I since "gult er kult" I went for the yellow one.

I have a soap that is supposedly a Geo F Trumpers Coconut soap. But since I bought it on ebay without any markings and without any coconutty scent. I am not sure.
What I am sure of, is that it lathers beautifully and it still has a nice scent. Very nice actually. And it was time to use it.

After an initial feeling of uncertainty I started to enjoy using the EJ. It felt very comfortable and I think it did a pretty good job.
I enjoyed it so much that I started to get overconfident and managed to get a few too many nicks and weepers. I set a new record actually.
I probably got a light burn as well
Hopefully with a little more practise I can settle into a nick free shaving experience.

A quick rinze, and some Witch Hazel later I was ready to try the Coconut lime version of TSD's After Shave Milk. And it did not take more than a whiff before it sky rocketed to the top of my good-smell hit list. It did not smell good, it smelled delicious And it did a pretty good job of calming my skin as well. It feels soft and properly moisturised, despite the above mentioned burn. And I do not often get to experience that sensation. Usually I need to apply a second layer or paint my face with the Nivea blue tin cream.
Good stuff.

Tools:

Facewash: Fitjar Face Wash
Razor: Edwin jagger DE89l
Blade: Gillette 7 o'Clock - Yellow edition
Brush: Proraso
Soap - Might be Geo F Trumper Coconut scented soap
AS Lotion: Thayers Witch Hazel
AS balm: TSD After Shave Milk - Coconut and lime

 

It did come wrapped in some sort of transparent plastic. But it performs great and smells wonderful. So I have to say that I do not care what brand it is

At ebay UK there are quite a few sellers selling these. And for a meager six pounds you can get two refill pucks.
I am almost tempted.

I should have written another post about tonites shave using the same razor and blade, but Tim Burtons Batman is on the tube