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"Though she doesn't love all hairy faces (she detests a poorly-grown mustache), Hackenmiller readily admits her weakness for men who embrace the inevitable growth of all things beard, and would encourage any man she meets to give their facial hair a shot.
"If it looks gross, persevere," she said. "Perseverance is key. I've learned through interviews that it's really hard to start one off. It's frustrating at first. It's like training. I hear the first two weeks are always bad, and then you get the glorious, luscious beard."
Check out the rest of this beard lover's musings on facial hair at Hairy Maine and Moostache.
When I reviewed the shaving cream from Pacific Shaving Company back in January, I mentioned that they had also sent me some Blade Oil to try out, and that I'd report back on the results. And I'm impressed.
For my evaluation, I decided to use a brand of razor blade that isn't the longest lasting (to my experience), instead of my usual Merkur or Feather. I had a pack of Bic blades from a free sampler pack I got somewhere, so I started with a fresh one and began my week of shaving. My usual is one week of shaves per razor, and even though I've had them go longer, I change them out when I feel some pull on my whiskers.
After each shave, I shook the razor dry and applied the Blade Oil to both sides of it and put it in the cabinet as usual. The applicator is like a big highlighter, so it's fast and easy to do, not messy at all.
A week went by, and then another. Tomorrow will be the 14th day on the same blade, and I haven't really noticed much of a dulling, so I'm going to keep going to see how long I can shave with it and still be comfortable. I'm sold.
Here's what Pacific Shaving says:
"The act of shaving is not the leading cause of a dull blade. In fact, the 24 hours in between shaves do more damage to your razor blades than the shave itself. Exposure to air (oxidation) corrodes blades quickly, leading to a jagged edge and ultimately nicks and cuts.
Using safe and natural ingredients, Blade Oil™ has been clinically shown to slow the effects of oxidation and extend blade life by up to 95%. This saves you money and produces less waste."
I'm not sure if it's the formula they are using for the oil (which is pretty complex), or just the application of oil which is really making the difference, but that sounds like a quest for the DIY guy - a homemade version of this, including applicator!
I highly recommend this product, and I'll report back when I decide to change the blade, to let you know how long it lasted.
"There are millions among us whose faces never see more than a five o'clock shadow, whose would-be chin-bushes perish in the sink each morning. Such is the cost of peer pressure and the tacit prohibition against scruff: With facial hair associated with hippies, religious fanaticism and captivity (think Saddam Hussein in his hole, or Leonardo in The Man in the Iron Mask), the naked cheek has taken over. With such widespread repression, we miss the delights of creative grooming, thoughtful stroking and mournful tearing. We lose the varieties of expression permitted by the gamut between the Fu Manchu and the French Fork. We lose an essential aspect of our human condition.
And so I issue a call to the beardless masses: Free your follicles. Emancipate your moustache. Unbridle your beard. You'll be sticking it to the man and looking great at the same time. Show all those people who said that only the clean-shaven can make it, that the spirit of Moses, Zeus and Tom Selleck lives on, and that we will not be intimidated."
By crikey, January flew by in a hurry, didn't it? After the rush of the holidays, you'd think that at least January would seem to be mellow - but it sure didn't for me! I missed a bunch of posts recently due to a bad accident I had, resulting in a broken ankle and some serious downtime, but if you missed any of the articles we did post, here's the January wrap-up, by category:
Japanese Shaving Commercials: Extreme or Just Extremely Weird?
Japanese pop and media culture is baffling to most of us, maybe because we're most often exposed to the weirdness, and not the everyday experience. Late night overdubbed Japanese game shows give us the impression that perhaps everything in Japan is very bizarre, and then YouTube confirms it. So I guess it shouldn't come as much of a surprise that companies marketing to the Japanese people are also using very strange messages to sell their products.
Here's a set of ads for Schick Protectors III, complete with spandex, that will leave you just shaking your head (and Google Translate version of the title beneath each):
Mr. Dude, of Best4Men, is gonna help save you from getting one of those Valentine's Day gifts that make you cringe.
No need to worry about hiding your distaste and forcing a smile after an awkward gift - just let her know ahead of time what you prefer. You don't even have to write the letter. Mr. Dude has a MadLibs-like letter generator that will take all of the work out of it for you.
Here's an excerpt of what I got:
"My dearest flasher in the park,
Last year, just after you returned from Tibet, we celebrated our Valentine's Day. I'll never forget that day because you wore a trash bag, and came home carrying a box of Ken dolls. You later told me these were for you, and were sent to you by your ex- manicurist, so that was awkward.
But I'll never forget the gift you gave me..."
OK, so they're not love letters, but it is good for some laughs - and there's a 10% off code, along with free shipping, for orders over $30.
Is the renaissance of facial hair related to its ability to disguise, to re-invent? Is it to make a male fashion statement? Or is it simply facial hair?
From Shiny Style:
"In the desert of men's style, facial hair is a rare oasis (or just a big bush, if we're doing analogy accuracy). It is, the more I think about it, a much better version of the female hairdo. It is free to grow and free to maintain. It can be altered day to day with only minimal effort. It requires no straightening, curling, spraying or highlighting. They aren't made to feel inadequate by celebs with 'beard extensions'. And, as far as I'm aware, no man is afraid to go out in the rain in case his beard goes fluffy."
Wahl Man of the Year Facial Hair Face-Off Finalists Announced
"Forty-two finalists sporting the most jaw-dropping beards, mustaches and goatees in America stand at the foot of the facial hair pedestal waiting to be crowned Wahl Man of the Year."
Last year, Wahl Trimmers sent a mobile barbershop around the country to "celebrate facial hair" and find contestants for the Man of the Year Facial Hair Face-Off. The contest attracted thousands of submissions, and the entries have now been narrowed down to the 42 finalists. For the top three winners, a 42" flat-screen HDTV is the prize, and the other 39 finalists will receive an MP4 player for their entries.
Voting for the Wahl Man of the Year began on January 18, and will end on Monday, February 8 at 5 p.m. CST. Be sure to head over there and vote for your favorite at Wahl Nation.
Wahl Clippers has been around for 91 years now, and they're still putting out new and innovative razors and trimmers, like the Lithium-Ion Trimmer, "the most powerful WAHL solution available."
This spring, are you thinking about getting a new image or a new look? Perhaps a change in facial hair or shaving routine? It's a good time to begin, as we begin to come out of our winter blues into the new energy of springtime. If we approach our grooming with a view to passion, as Art of Shaving does, we may find a whole new experience waiting for us.
"The Art of Shaving brings art and passion to a daily routine."
One of the leaders of the shaving renaissance, Art of Shaving has a great line of natural shaving products and hand-made grooming accessories - high quality, dependable, and stylish.
And starting Thursday morning, you can pick up those purchases you've been putting off, because everything at Art of Shaving is 20% off through Sunday night!
My picks? Both the safety razors and straight razors catch my eye, and the high quality shaving brushes are amazing. I like the kits that are pre-packaged, so you'll get an idea of what the shaving products do when used together, and the hair and body care products are also all natural and cover the rest of your personal care needs.
I also noticed that the Sterling Silver Shaving Set, "the most elegant and luxurious shaving set available", is on sale for only $1700, down from the regular price of $3400. I wonder if you can get 20% off of that? That would make it only $1360. Still quite a bit out of my price range, but it sure is a beautiful piece.
You might want to make a note of heading over to Art of Shaving tomorrow to see if something you've been putting of buying is now priced within your reach. The sale runs through Jan. 31.
My apologies for leaving you hanging last week - I had a bit of an emergency in my life and wasn't able to get any posts up here. Even if I had written some, they probably wouldn't have made any sense to you, due to the pain medication I've been on.
A week ago Friday, I took a big fall while messing around on some rocks with a friend. I landed right on my foot, which ended up with me breaking the ends of my leg bones, right at the ankle. I can't put any weight on it, and have had x-rays, MRI, and tomorrow a CT scan to determine if surgery is necessary. I'm thankful for the prescription for Percocet so I can deal with the pain!
Anyway, after laying in bed for several days, I decided to really get washed up and shaved and into new clothes, just so I would feel better about myself (I was feeling like a patient, an invalid, not a free man). That was an ordeal, but after we figured out how to prop my knee up onto a chair in front of the sink, and put everything within reach, I was able to have a great shave. I felt like a new man afterward!
My thoughts were that if I could feel this much better after a shave, and I only had a broken leg, then what about someone with a broken arm or hand, or someone elderly, who can't control his razor well enough to shave safely? It seems like something relatively small - shaving someone's face who can't do it themselves - but it could have a big impact on that person's attitude in general.
Do you have a father or grandfather who needs assistance? Any relative or friend with a disability who might be really grateful for a shave? Perhaps mobile shaving would be a good move for a local barber shop - going to people's homes and giving them a close shave, maybe even as a volunteer sort of venture?
[Image is totally unrelated, but it's such a great pic, don't you think?]
Check out how far we've come in our advertising and grooming trends with this 1950 Gillette razor TV commercial with baseball stars Pee Wee Reese and Roy Campanella.
"A boy has more self respect when he's clean shaved."
A man from Virginia, Muhammed Abu Tahir, was on Air Tran flight 39 from Atlanta to San Francisco and decided to have about five airline-sized bottles of wine during the flight. He then decided to take a visit to the lavatory and get a bit more comfortable.
He took off his shoes and socks and placed them outside the door of the bathroom. He then removed his shirt, opened the door, and began shaving. Flight attendants tried to coax him back to his seat, but he wasn't having any of it (maybe it was an epic shave?)
Muhammed turned aggressive and refused to return to his seat, forcing flight personnel and passengers to 'guard' the door to the lavatory. He remained in the bathroom until the flight made an emergency landing at Colorado Springs (F-16's were scrambled to help escort the flight, just in case). He was then arrested and transported to jail.
So let that be a lesson to you - if you're gonna shave, do it before you fly. If you're gonna get ripped during the flight, stay in your seat and don't annoy the rest of the passengers...
Review of Pacific Shaving Company's All Natural Shaving Cream
Before Pacific Shaving Company sent me a couple of their products to check out, the only thing I knew about them was the rave reviews they've gotten on their Shaving Oil. I've not tried it myself, but it's been well received by the green and natural community due to its all natural ingredients.
I'm not so keen on shaving oils for my everyday shave, so when they sent me some of their all natural Shaving Cream to try, I was jazzed, because I prefer a cream over a gel or oil. That's just what works best for me. They also sent me a tube of their Blade Oil, which I'll be using on my safety razor for a while, and then I'll write up a review of that.
The Pacific Shaving Cream has a very light scent - almost scent-free, but with a hint of botanicals. I prefer that to a strong smelling cream, so that was a definite plus for me. Instead of using my fingers to apply it and lather my face, I used my shaving brush, and the lather was almost effortless.
The company calls it a low-lather cream, but I found that to not be the case, at least with a brush. I got a good heavy lather with only a tiny bit of the cream, and could do a second pass with the lather left in the brush, so I think the jar is going to last a lot longer than the statement on the jar of 40 shaves.
The quality of the shave was great, with excellent razor slip and an easy rinse afterward. My face felt moisturized, without a hint of razor burn.
I think it's a great shaving cream, especially if you are the least bit concerned about the ingredients of products you put on your skin. The only thing I would like to see is a bigger jar. Even if a jar lasts for 40 shaves, that might mean you need to buy 12 jars per year, and I'm a big fan of bulk sizes for things I use every day. It's just less wasteful. The company does have an environmental initiative going with Trees for the Future, whereby they plant a tree for each bottle of shaving oil they sell, so there's another another reason to check out their line of natural shaving products.
It's amazing to me that so many people are up in arms about other people's facial hair choices. Seriously. I follow news items about beards as a part of my job of staying on top of shaving trends and stories, and when I open my newsreader in the morning, I'm stymied by the attention (or lack of) that some of these stories get.
Here's a few beard news stories I'd like to share with you:
Brad Pitt's face gets all the play: Pitt's goatee, complete with mini-dreadlocks, has dominated the celebrity facial hair scene lately, and I can't quite understand the controversy. He's an actor, right? And actors change their looks for roles, yeah? So what's the big deal? Do you think he cares about what the rest of us think of his beardedness? I don't. Let's let the man grow what he wants to on his face.
And on the flip-side, style gurus are saying "The new must-have accessory? A beard": "George Clooney makes us swooney and never more so than with his latest look, a grizzled salt-and-pepper beard that takes the Oscar-winner from dashing to debonair." So it's OK for Clooney, but not Pitt? Hmm.
You better not shave in Somalia: Dozens of men in Somalia's southern city of Kismayo were arrested and jailed by religious police for shaving their beards. Evidently the state has banned the shaving of beards (or ordered men to grow them, however you want to look at it), and will arrest you for violating Islamic culture laws.
In boxing news, the Amateur Boxing Association of England (ABAE) has banned all facial hair from its fighters, which would bar the Sikh and Muslim boxers with beards from competing: "It's such a petty go at the beard. It's a sport and it has some risks but the hair does not really in any way increase those risks. It's a perverse retrograde step that should be challenged." - Dr Indarjit Singh, Network of Sikh Organizations
Despite shortage of rabbis in the Army, this one can't wear his beard and be a military chaplain: "There is only one [Jewish chaplain] right now in all of Europe. We have a large number of young, selfless rabbis who would come to active duty as long as the beard regulation is waived. They are not fearful of going to war zones, because they are so dedicated and committed to reaching out to all Jews."
It has recently come to my attention that a disposable razor that also dispenses shaving cream is growing in popularity and has been picked up by both Target and Walgreens: the ShaveMate Titan and Diva (the women's version). I haven't actually used one of these, but after looking at it and trying to see what practical benefit it could possibly have, I came away feeling that while it's creative, it just doesn't make sense for most of us.
The Titan has a multiblade razor at the top, and the handle also serves as a shaving cream dispenser (the website says it has "real" shaving cream - I'm glad they didn't use fake shaving cream...). The company says that this feature gives you a week's worth of shaves with no "messy rusty rings on the counter" and also says it prevents the need for extra cans of shaving cream in showers or on crowded countertops.
OK, that may be true. It may cut down on the crowding factor, if you are pressed for space. And I can see a market for the traveler who forgot to pack his razor, or for active duty military, or for disaster relief, but I just don't see how this can be a useful product for most men.
For one thing, it's a disposable razor, and will need to be thrown out after a week or so, and the fact that the handle and shaving cream dispenser unit get thrown out as well makes me see this as extremely wasteful.
And I just have to wonder if the blades get dull before the cream is empty, or will the cream run out before the blades are dull? Either way, I could see the tendency to want to hang on to a razor just because it had shaving cream left inside that I could use, which means that I would then have two of these on my counter.
Another issue I have is that I imagine we'll see lots of these end up half used in airport and hotel trashcans, due to people not wanting to pack them, and I just don't see the upside to having more plastic trash. My personal preference, a DE safety razor, needs only one single blade to be replaced when it's dull, and that's one other reason I really like it.
The selling points for the Titan also include the S3 Flex-Neck 'technology', which is just a fancy name for saying that the razor flexes at the head to follow the contours of your face. My razor doesn't do that, but I still get a great shave, so I don't see the plus in this unless you're a lazy shaver.
Having said all that, I do think the Titan is a creative idea, but I just think it's more of a gimmick or an impulse travel purchase rather than a reliable razor for daily shaving.
Hairy Maine and Moostache: The Female Pogonophile
From the 
When I reviewed the shaving cream from 
From the 
By crikey, January flew by in a hurry, didn't it? After the rush of the holidays, you'd think that at least January would seem to be mellow - but it sure didn't for me! I missed a bunch of posts recently due to a bad accident I had, resulting in a broken ankle and some serious downtime, but if you missed any of the articles we did post, here's the January wrap-up, by category:
Japanese pop and media culture is baffling to most of us, maybe because we're most often exposed to the weirdness, and not the everyday experience. Late night overdubbed Japanese game shows give us the impression that perhaps everything in Japan is very bizarre, and then YouTube confirms it. So I guess it shouldn't come as much of a surprise that companies marketing to the Japanese people are also using very strange messages to sell their products.
Mr. Dude, of Best4Men, is gonna help save you from getting one of those Valentine's Day gifts that make you cringe. 
Is the renaissance of facial hair related to its ability to disguise, to re-invent? Is it to make a male fashion statement? Or is it simply facial hair?
This spring, are you thinking about getting a new image or a new look? Perhaps a change in facial hair or shaving routine? It's a good time to begin, as we begin to come out of our winter blues into the new energy of springtime. If we approach our grooming with a view to passion, as Art of Shaving does, we may find a whole new experience waiting for us.
My apologies for leaving you hanging last week - I had a bit of an emergency in my life and wasn't able to get any posts up here. Even if I had written some, they probably wouldn't have made any sense to you, due to the pain medication I've been on.
A man from Virginia, 
Before 
It's amazing to me that so many people are up in arms about other people's facial hair choices. Seriously. I follow news items about beards as a part of my job of staying on top of shaving trends and stories, and when I open my newsreader in the morning, I'm stymied by the attention (or lack of) that some of these stories get. 
It has recently come to my attention that a disposable razor that also dispenses shaving cream is growing in popularity and has been picked up by both Target and Walgreens: the 
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