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SOTD FRIDAY, MAY 1, 2020
To kick off May, I decided to go old school, since I fit the category. It’ll be a May Mayhem launch. I selected my French Spadson DE that dates from the late 20s to the early 30s. It was originally designed to supposedly have a mild side and an aggressive side. Frenchmen in those days must have had Kevlar beards, because the easiest way to characterize the two shave sides of this razor head for me is as insanely aggressive and positively assaultive.
In order to anesthetize my two shave surfaces - face and noggin - I selected one of the coldest menthol combinations in my den, Fine Accoutrements Snake Bite Soap and AS. I then added 3 drops of M-Bomb to the soap. In hindsight the M-Bomb was a bit much! But I was hoping for numbness to help deal with the potential bloodshed. El Scratcho (
@9nein9) would be proud!
I selected my favorite Boar brush, the Omega Pro48 and soaked the tips in ice water, and set aside a bowl of ice water, totally influenced by my old FB friend, Joe (
@JACarbone). I normally start every shave with a cold water rinse right out of the tap, but must admit that the ice water rinse was much more refreshing. Now the M-Bomb salted Snake Bite was close to my menthol limit, but the ice water lather felt great.
Everything seemed to be going swimmingly when I picked up the Spadson and loaded a Voskhod in the vain hope of mitigating future mishap. I thought I was using the insanely aggressive side of the head, but quickly discovered that it was the assaultive side as I experienced a set-down error by my right sideburn which my styptic put to rights. An auspicious beginning you ask?
Well I quickly flipped the head and very carefully rode the cap through the rest of that first WTG pass using very careful short strokes, with special attention devoted to my dome, and managed to complete it without further bloodshed. A check with the alum did reveal considerable heat around my usual trouble spots. That first pass did shear through my whiskers right down to the skin line.
In the interest of self preservation I confined the second pass to very careful WTG buffing around my problem areas and ended with a nick above my Adam’s Apple and three weepers on the back of the noggin that the Thayers dealt with. A check with the alum revealed a fair bit of irritation around the buffed areas leaving me with a shave hovering between CCS and DFS, pretty much what I expected. I feel a bit sore, somewhat smooth, but definitely very cool and content that I managed to keep the damage under control. Time to store this torture implement until Awkward August rolls around.
RAZOR: French Spadson DE
BLADE: Voskhod
PREP: Ice water rinse
BRUSH: Omega Pro48 Boar
SOAP: Fine Accoutrements Snake Bite
POSTSHAVE: Ice water wash with Glyce Glycerin soap followed by Thayers Lavender WH and Snake Bite AS Splash. Finished with Cremo Cooling Post Shave Balm
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