January 2016 30 Day Rule/Focus Pic&Discussion Thread

Anyone who loves Voskhod is a friend of mine, a man of tremendously fantastic taste, and definitely receives the Cartel stamp of approval. The boys salute you!

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Ah that inner me, Ivan, Igor, Boris and all the rest of the voices in my head are friendly, but not necessarily sane. As we've said many times, when you hear my voice in your head, or the phrase "what's the worst that can happen" you have two choices. Man up and find out or wise up and tap out! Glad to see my opinion of the MEM validated. And when Jason at tryablade.com wants a blade gone you KNOW it's bad. Seems like we're seeing some unfortunate movement of blade manufacturing to China. It appears the Chinese grabbed the name and produced crap as they usually do on their own. The only Chinese blades that I have any faith in, other than the Rimei, are the ones still being made by Schick and Gillette to their standards in China.

 

Great to see you well and back to yourself

 

And.... Now we're back!

 

Love that setup!

 

21 shaves on a GSB... Go get some!

 

Chris, it's really nice and simple. I'm thinking about letting it run another day? The La Toja and Clubman Vanilla work excellent together! I'm getting low on Clubman, which happens to be my favorite sent of the Clubman line.

 

Welcome back! Hope everything settles down and you are well for a while! Yea the guys decided it would be fun to get a MEM in my razor and then convince me to go ahead and try using it. I think when I made that comment about my month being an homage to you they took it a little too seriously! I still have 3 Chinese blades in my group that may or may not ever get used. The Baili, Rimei, and Vincent. Guess we will see if Ivan, Igor, or Boris ever get back into my head!

Again welcome back!!

 

La Toja almost goes with anything, it just smells clean. I plan on focusing on TSD ISZ AS Splash under Pinaud products for the rest of the year.

 

SR status change:

I am off the paddle strop and on to the black @Drygulch "45". 25 on webbing, 50 in bridle leather has equaled two nice shaves the last day. I plan on going back to the WD SR for comparison today.

Also, thanks to Jim ( @Norcalnewb ) for his "baseball" pattern of attack, I switched to his pattern a week ago, great idea. I am at the point where I am shaving, catching CCS/DFS automatically, and have finally picked up enough confidence to chase a little bit.

Straight Razor is fairly easy to learn, in terms of how to make the razor shave my face, but seems very difficult to master. So far, super happy and encouraged, and will be finishing out my 90 shaves easily!

 

Nice shave tonight went back to my merkur 34c. For a long time I've been puzzled by those of you that enjoy a more mild razor. However my view has changed along with my skill set I assume, as I've had no problem replicating the results of my much more aggressive 1924. Now I get it. It really is a pleasure using a mild razor.... Properly. I do prefer my 1924 but it's more of a weekend shaver, when I have more time and energy. I think I will tackle my sample pack in the 34c for February focus as I've still only experienced Astra blades, and I'd like to either pledge allegiance to the cartel or opt out.

 

Glad things are going so well. Everything about straights appeals to me. They look cool as and the art form itself is very cool but from what I've heard it seems very time consuming and high maintenance. Would this be a fair comment?

 

I will go on record as saying I prefer a more aggressive DE setup. After trying aggressive injectors and learning how to shave with high blade gap and exposure, out in front of aggressive geometry, I hurt myself trying to get smooth with mild razors.

 

At least the chain saw is heavier than the razor so you can't get them mixed up.

 

Astra is a Russian blade and probably the bang-for-buck champ of DE blades, you're in the cartel already! We're insidious like that.

 

To be fair I've not chased the baby with a mild set up for the same reason. But I'm starting to settle for a dfs when pushed for time. I think saving the aggresive set up for a BBS at weekends will be both a treat and better on my skin.

 

Fair comment. It's more maintenance and fuss... But the "cool" factor is there in spades. Honestly, Tom, I would wait until you can shave in the dark with any safety razor for two pass dfs+ automatically. Get sloppy with a DE, you get razor burn, but sloppy with an SR means off to surgery for some sutures! Had I started just a couple months after converting from carts, I would have quit in frustration. Hanging out for a year let me learn everything I needed. It's been kinda easy for me because the blade and strop are the only two things I am learning. I mastered prep, lather, etc long ago freeing my mind to just shave!

 

I had no idea Astra was Russian. There's the newbie in me shining through. I've been in the cartel since day 1 and had absolutely no knowledge of my own involvement.

 

Glad to have you totally back and will continue to pray for your healing.

 

Happy to have you back. I'm glad you are feeling better.