Shaveblogging update

Okay. I give up. I lose. I am a pansy. A wimp. A wuss. A limp-wristed poofter.

I. Can't. Shave. With. Soap.

I get the idea, I really do. Basic soap puts little between the razor and the whisker and thus will not gum things up and make for a close shave. But it freakin' HURTS. Remember that scene in Airplane! where the guy is in the lavatory trying to shave while the plane is landing, and the plane keeps bumping and he keeps cutting himself? And then he slaps some (alcohol-based) after shave on, screams in pain and falls over passed out?

That was me this morning.

When I was on vacation at my ancestral home, I thought I'd have a go with my dad's (RIP) shaving brush. So I went out and bought some $3 old-timey shave soap, slapped it in a mug, got a good froth going, dashingly whipped it on my face, and went at it. Oye. Hurt hurt hurt and I had to keep lathering just so it wouldn't dry out.

Eh, maybe it was the cheap stuff, I thought. Maybe if I put down some real money, I would finally enjoy the true joy of back-to-nature shaving (or at least back-to-the-1940s shaving). So yesterday I wandered into some froo-froo boutique soap-and-candle store and bought a [whatever smelly floral stuff it was] and mint shaving soap. In its own little wooden bowl! $12. With extra moisturizers and junk, the fetching young saleslady assured me. (Me? Unduly influenced? Nah.)

It lathered up better than the cheapy stuff but it still hurt like the dickens. JAYsus. No matter how much I worked up more lather it still felt like I was dragging a dull obsidian knife across my face. Images of Mayan bloodletting flitted across my imagination; though in fact I did avoid any actual lacerations. And STILL when I rubbed in a little astringent, my eyes bugged out far more than they should at that hour of the morning.

So I quit. All of you Real Men out there who prove your manhood daily by using only soap, you win this one. I shall happily wear my badge of wimpdom and concede that, at least in this area, you are my masculine betters. Back to Noxzema I go, chastened, but at least I will have an intact face.