PIF; The Story Of My Beginning

Hi Y'all! I sure hope today is treating you well!

There is a lot of PIF activity going on around The Den these days. It is very awesome to see all of these free shave vibes happening.

I have given so many things away over this past year I can hardly recall all of them. I once received a comment in one of our threads that if I kept giving things away, I was going to go broke. My response; yep, that is the point.

Besides the religious connotations of giving things away, let me tell you another reason why you see me giving so many things away.

Back in March of 2010, I started looking into our shave obsession. I joined most if not all of the shave boards available at the time. I poked around here and there, vacuuming up all the shave info I could find, trying to figure out which brands of equipment I should buy to get started.

One day, soon after I joined this other forum and had posted my introduction, I received a PM from a guy named Gary in Wisconsin. Gary dropped me a PM to say hello and welcome to the forum (not TSD.) Gary went on to tell me that he has family in my area and that up and till then, no one had joined the forum from this area, and as a special welcome, he wanted to send me a sampling of blades from his stash. I was absolutely shocked that a stranger on an internet forum was offering to send me free stuff. I accepted the offer of blades and a few days later they arrived.

I figured maybe I would get a blade or two. Imagine my surprise when when the box arrived and I had received a full pack each of:

Gillette 7 O' Clock Black
Gillette 7 O' Clock Green
Shark
Derby
Blue Bird
Treet

I was completely blown away by the generosity exhibited by Gary! I sent him a PM thanking him and told him if he was ever in the area to look me up and I would buy him a round of the beverages of his choosing.

I never heard back from Gary. He was sort of like the story of the vanishing hitchhiker.

About a month after receiving my blades, maybe a little less than a month, I found TSD. While that other forum was a good source of information, with very friendly people, I found myself gravitating to TSD more and more frequently, until one day, I realized that I had been visiting only TSD and decided to make TSD my home. Since I have been on TSD, I have posted to no other forums. I have joined a couple other boards, but only because you have to be a member in order to see some of the pictures.

Over the last eleven months, I have developed a serious TSD habit. In fact, here in my house, TSD trumps Facebook! Yes Brothers and Sisters, TSD threads are checked each day long before Facebook is even given consideration. BabyGirl pointed this out to me today during supper.

Here at TSD, we are like a family and I Love Y'all! We share love and laughter, anger and joy, marriages, separations, and the begining and end of our mortal bodies on earth.

One of the ways that I can share my love for TSD, is to try and impart the same kindness on others as was shown to me by a complete stranger with a gift of free blades.

I am keeping alive the spirit that was instilled in me so many months ago by Paying It Forward, just as was done to me. I am not the only one though; there are many others who had the same experience as I, and they too continue to pass the torch.

So there you have it Y'all; the story of my PIF-ishness and my beginning here at TSD!

What about you? What is your story?

 

:happy096 Great story Jeff, that fills in a lot of blanks.

Thanks for sharing! :happy088

I've shared my story many times before, so I won't bore everyone by re-posting it.

 

Thanks Bill!

There will be much more interesting and diversified stuff to come; just trying to keep the new forum alive for now!

 

Thanks for the story Jeff. You are an inspiration.

 

Excellent start to the articles section.

I started out when the price of Mach 3 cartridges went up because Gillette wanted to push everyone to the fusion. I searched around the internet and found the just published article on Art of Manliness along with various shave boards.

At the time I used just a Mach 3 and water as I react very badly to anything from a can. So, I started by picking up VDH soap and boar brush. It impressed me enough I asked my grandfather if he had any old DE razors hidden away. Turns out he had his dad's old Super Speed and Knack (which couldn't have been more than a few years old when he passed). That Super Speed is still my favorite shaver.

It was really only after I decided I wanted to stick with the whole wet shaving thing that I joined a couple boards. After about 6 months I found I was only posting regularly on TSD. At about the two year mark I was asked to become a moderator.

For me what was really paid forward was time. Finding people who will take the time to listen to areas where I struggled and make a genuine effort to help. I try to repay that to those at TSD - both long time members and new members alike.

Not to say I don't PIF stuff a little, though I try to keep it quite and don't have as much to give as Jeff. I do plan to get in on the PIF month, though expect it later in the month.

 

Jeff, Erik, great stories! Just wondering if anyone can add their humble beginnings or is it an invitation only thing?

 

It's open for one and all, feel free to add your story Dan.

 

my humble beginning

I had been out on a medical leave for 3 months and was rapidly growing tired of facebooking and other surfing, so being of old school descent, I began searching google for old school shaving.

I found numerous sites that sold the DE and Str8 razors along with all the necessary equipment to accompany the art. Then I saw TSD website and decided to check it out. I was fascinated with the amount of other people that had the same interest and began perusing the different forums. Day after day, I came back and red as many posts as I could. It wasn't until I saw a link for Mantics videos that I became completely hooked, after watching them all.

I decided right then that I needed to buy some equipment, after having asked my elders if they still had any of the old razors. They just seemed in awe that I was wanting to drop kick the new fangled razors to the curb and gave me their best wishes and encouragement. I think deep down, they wished that they had hung on to their old razors to join my mission.

I went to Joe at shaveabuck and ordered my first set up. I spent the next several days practically racing to the mailbox to see if it had arrived. Finally, one day there was a meager sized box just sitting there. I had imagined in my mind that the shave gear was larger than life, I suppose.

I was tearing the box open as I walked back to the house. Once I set out my new Parker22R, stainless shave bowl and the boar brush, I watched Mantics vids once more. I wanted to make sure I knew what I was supposed to do.

I had been wet shaving for a long time, but never with a DE razor. I will never forget my first DE shave! Even if I had remaining whiskers, which I didn't, it would have been one of the most satisfying shaves of my life. They say you never forget your first. I can attest that this is true. And TSD was my first contact with others like me. It has been a passion of mine ever since.

Since then I have wandered to a couple of other sites, but NONE have the same friendliness as TSD and all of its fantastic members. Thanks to each and everyone here for making this shave forum as Jeff says, "The best shave forum on the planet"!

 

Yes Sir! You are quite right! Excellent point!

 

Yes! Great story, man! I didn't know how you found this place, but many people are glad you did because you are so generous with your stuff and so willing to share your knowledge!

I have told mine before... it started while I was googling a specific barbershop smell aftershave. I found a TSD forum where guys were talking about it, and I had no idea people were out there using these old shaving tools. I was strictly a canned goo and cartridge guy. But I was just too danged curious when I stumbled upon TSD, and I decided to dig deeper into the forums to see more. I couldn't stop reading, and now here I am months later with a few straights that I am cleaning up, some rotating DEs, and a couple of bizarre looking single edge razors that Lloyd quoted another person saying that they look like "medieval torture devices." I'm rummaging through antique stores and flea market bins and have about five brushes I am trying to restore, and a bunch of samples of creams, soaps, aftershaves and colognes.

I'm getting the best shaves of my life now. Super close. The best part for me is that I am going to Turkey in a few weeks, and while there, I'll be meeting one of the Den members who lives there. I am taking him some injectors that he cannot get in his part of the world. Another member is sending me some injectors that I am taking to Lloyd on the trip, and he's PIF'd me a couple of soaps on top of that. I'm going to make a thread about this trip soon, but how awesome is that!? This is all madness and I like it! This is a great place... I belong to the other forum you mentioned for the same reason. I haven't posted, but I only do it to for the pictures. This is really the place to be. No doubt you play a major role in why this is true: it is the best wetshaving board on the planet!

 

Wow this is a great thread...Thanks for sharing Dan, its always great hearing what you have to say...Erik is one of those guys whose advice I always dig and agree with and appreciate...JoAnna, she's got over 20,000 post of help, advise, and humor, what more can you say...And Bill has never hesitated to help with advice or pifs, or that Master Sticky of his is like the "Keys to the Kingdom" and he always follows up immediately...
And cyb you're right, it is a fine madness, or magic that we have here, indiscribable....Looking forward to seeing you with fire in your ears. And I also want to thank Alan from AZ for the Pif of those injectors that you're bringing, he told me it was doing him a favor by using and enjoying them..Well I'll be enjoying them for years to come...

And Jeff, thanks so for sharing your story of how you settled here. You've become a legend around here and deservedly so. Thanks for being my Guardian Razor Angel, and for always being there for me....I'll be thanking you for years to come aswell my friend...I'm still looking for some Obsidian blades to try and pay you back with...

 

I don't remember how exactly I ended up here, but I know why I stayed. When I first got here, Jeff (stingray) was giving all sorts of stuff away to people. I thought it was a nice jesture, and offered to send him a coaster and some magnets or something that I made. I don't really remember exactly what it was, but someone that was willing to give to a complete stranger deserved something for his actions. My thought was that the board might not have all the traffic some others do, but there was a good core of folks here and it seemed like a nice place.

 

Great article Jeff, thanks, and thanks for all that you do here.
Though I've told my story before, here it is again. My partner at work, out of nowhere, just handed me a Muhle Pure Badger Brush, Taylor's Mr. Taylor SC, and C&E Nomad Soap. "just try it." He gave me a quick demonstration how to lather in the kitchen of our office-to the strange looks of our employees and partners. I was smitten. I got on Google to find out more about this and quickly discovered The Shave Den. I got on Amazon to order a 38c-my partner was still using a cartridge and advised me not to mess with the crazy old fashioned razors as I'd rip my face apart. Now, 15 months later, I finally convinced him to try a DE. I lent him my 1950's Superspeed (the razor he learned on when he was a young man) 2 weeks ago. He now has his own Superspeed, a Merkur 38c, and a EJ89. He called me just today to complain that he spent way too much money at Merz Apothecary in Chicago. I also have to mention Frank, my Italian Barber. He's been cutting my hair since I was 9 years old and cut my father's, grandfather's, and now my son's hair. He's been an inspiration, a fountain of knowledge, and generous with some of his old toys-a wonderful Henckle's Friodur Razor, a Belgium Blue Coticule, a strop, and several pucks of Master Well Comb Mug soap. As Jeff says, I to to TSD before, and more frequently than I go to Facebook. Long Live The Shave Den, and Long Live our Queen. JoAnna-even though you publicly busted me for draining TSD stock of menthol, you're the best.

 

So it's due out this summer?

:happy102

 

:ashamed001