Just getting started. Acquiring things as I can afford to. Just some stuff Ive acquired on Amazon and at the drug store. Using Tapatalk on my phone to post and the battery is low, maybe I'll post the details later.
Welcome to the Den. We know you'll fit right in. So grab yourself a comfy chair, and give our threads a spin! Burma Shave
I am still putting it all together and figuring it out. I had been looking at getting a DE razor for about a year or two but was distracted by other things. After a pretty awful year last year, it occurred to me that I should stop looking and start doing. No time like the present to pick up new hobbies and interests. Looking at brewing my own beer soon too. As far as my current kit. It's not like supper awesome. It's what I could afford and looked interesting. My razor is a Merkur 180 I have two brushes. An Escali badger brush which I've been using primarily. The other one is a VDH boar brush I found while at the drug store looking for something for my mom. Admittedly I have mostly been using whatever old cans of shaving cream I have to use them up. I have some new stuff I bought In a tube, Cremo because of a rebate. Used it once but my technique royally sucked. I have two other tubes also but I forget what they were exactly. Doing a lot of research now, I often do that anyway, but this time it's on something useful. Blades at the moment are just some drug store ones I bought (CVS & Walgreen's) and I have some Dorco blades also but I think they're in the back of my car which is in the shop with transmission issues for the third time, they better fix it this time. I plan on driving to Orlando for Megacon this month, better not strand me there! Haven't shaved much in the last two weeks, my mom had surgery on her foot, now she's in the hospital with pneumonia, probably won't be out until Monday. Sorry for the novel, not much else to do sitting in a hospital room.
Sorry for all your problems.. I hope your mom gets better real soon.. Sounds like you have the beginnings of a nice kit..I'd add a nice (as large as you can afford) blade sampler and a puck of VDH Delux soap, it's usually pretty easy to find locally at grocery or drugstores, some small ZipLoc storage bowls for holding your soap pucks and a coffee mug or cereal bowl from home for lather making... If you decide to use a preshave, I use Corn Huskers Lotion, it works as well as either Proraso or Jack Black for me and is a "TON" cheaper...Nivea make a good and fairly inexpensive postshave balm.....Take your time,do your research,ask any questions you may have here and it will all come together eventually... Time,Technique,Practice and Patience will get you to the best shaves of your life...
I just got a shaving set with another VDH boar brush, bowl and soap, and the Nivea balm on my way back to the hospital. Strange thing happened though. 3 cars flashed headlights, and one honked at me, in the dark, and nothing I could see wrong standing closer to the car, I'm spooked. Meh Maybe neighbors who recognized her car, dunno.
Great to have you! I would suggest to watch a few youtube videos from GeoFatboy, Mantic59, and a new dude on the scene that IMO does a pretty good job, Nick Shaves. Blades are a big deal when first starting out. You'll read "YMWV" (your mileage will vary) often in reference to everything wet shaving, but consistently the Astra SP blades get great reviews, and can be found on the cheap just about everywhere online. Also check out the Gillette Silver Blues, which give a great shave, and can also be found on the cheap. One last thing. Early on in my wet shaving experience, I gave up on soaps because I didn't know how to load the soap onto the brush in order to get a rich lather so I just used shaving creams. It was a mistake. I recently used two soaps after seeing a video on an unrelated item where I saw the reviewer load the soap. I used the observed technique (simply adding some water to the tin and letting it sit for a few minutes) and BAM! I got a great lather and loved the feeling the soaps gave my face. Go figure!
