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For the Love of Old Spice - Illini's Shave Journal

Scuttlesoap said:
You are way more organized than I could ever be! I looked in the app store - and found several pen and ink collection apps. Big time cool.

Have a fantastic day!
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I'm sure there are quite a few now - I've stuck to a tried and true method, good old Excel spreadsheets! :LOL:

Swabbing the inks onto cards and keeping them in old school baseball card protectors has proven to be an equally simple but effective catalog!

GearNoir said:
91 different inks tried?! Holy moly! 😮
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Yessir! Even when I was deep in the hobby I really didn't have the appetite to spend the tons and tons of money you could easily sink into pens, and rather found a lot of the fun in trying all kinds of inks (which of course was MUCH cheaper!)
 
Happy Friday Cadre, we made it through another week! Sun is out for the first time in a while it seems which is a welcomed change. Should be a fairly relaxed weekend with no big plans on the agenda. We're planning to start potty training the little man starting next weekend, so will be doing the "required reading" and picking up the essentials per the wife's orders.

Continue the Williams and Bic SP challenges, with today's shave being the best yet for both lather and blade!

Thanks for reading, have a wonderful weekend friends!

Friday February 4th, 2022
Razor : '55 Gillette Red Tip SS
Blade : Bic SP (4)
Brush : Whipped Dog HM
Pre : Shower
Soap : Canadian Williams Mug
Post : Burberry Hero EdT Sample (RIP)

PXL_20220204_180224043.jpg​
 
Hope everyone had a great weekend! Ours was fairly relaxed with nothing too excited going on. A few small errands, some cleaning, but mostly just bummed around the house and enjoying time as a family. Hoping for a mostly quiet week at work but always seems to be the weeks that appear quiet end up being the exhausting ones. Time well tell!

Shaves with the Canadian Williams and Bic SP continue to be great, and I finished off two more frag sample vials this weekend too. Wouldn't purchase the JV XX Indigo as it's too generic for me, but the Spicebomb Infrared was as good in a sample bottle as it was when I tried it in Sephora, so will be adding it to the purchase list. Definitely think it'll be a nice wintertime / Christmastime frag. For some reason, I've never gotten as good a lather with Williams using my boar brushes, so sticking to synth and my lone Badger HM as I work through this tub.

Thanks for catching up with me!

Saturday February 5th, 2022
Razor : '56 Gillette Flare Tip SS
Blade : Bic SP (5)
Brush : Razorock F400
Pre : Shower
Soap : Canadian Williams Mug
Post : JV XX Indigo EdT (RIP)

Sunday February 6th, 2022
Razor : Gillette Prewar Ball-end Tech
Blade : Bic SP (6)
Brush : Stirling Kong
Pre : Shower
Soap : Canadian Williams Mug
Post : Spicebomb Infrared EdT (RIP)

Monday February 7th, 2022
Razor : '66 Gillette Slim
Blade : Bic SP (7)
Brush : EverReady 100T with Plisson Knot
Pre : Shower
Soap : Canadian Williams Mug
Post : Grey Flannel EdT
 
Fightingillini22 said:
Hope everyone had a great weekend! Ours was fairly relaxed with nothing too excited going on. A few small errands, some cleaning, but mostly just bummed around the house and enjoying time as a family. Hoping for a mostly quiet week at work but always seems to be the weeks that appear quiet end up being the exhausting ones. Time well tell!

Shaves with the Canadian Williams and Bic SP continue to be great, and I finished off two more frag sample vials this weekend too. Wouldn't purchase the JV XX Indigo as it's too generic for me, but the Spicebomb Infrared was as good in a sample bottle as it was when I tried it in Sephora, so will be adding it to the purchase list. Definitely think it'll be a nice wintertime / Christmastime frag. For some reason, I've never gotten as good a lather with Williams using my boar brushes, so sticking to synth and my lone Badger HM as I work through this tub.

Thanks for catching up with me!

Saturday February 5th, 2022
Razor : '56 Gillette Flare Tip SS
Blade : Bic SP (5)
Brush : Razorock F400
Pre : Shower
Soap : Canadian Williams Mug
Post : JV XX Indigo EdT (RIP)

Sunday February 6th, 2022
Razor : Gillette Prewar Ball-end Tech
Blade : Bic SP (6)
Brush : Stirling Kong
Pre : Shower
Soap : Canadian Williams Mug
Post : Spicebomb Infrared EdT (RIP)

Monday February 7th, 2022
Razor : '66 Gillette Slim
Blade : Bic SP (7)
Brush : EverReady 100T with Plisson Knot
Pre : Shower
Soap : Canadian Williams Mug
Post : Grey Flannel EdT
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Hi, love your journal, read all, over the past week,good stuff. You have differant stuff in the USA (soaps and frags) nice reading
 
Trucking along, yesterday was busy but nothing too crazy. Definitely one of the days I was happy we are still fulltime WFH as it allowed me to really buckle down and get stuff done without the constant interruptions of the office.

A random frag free sample appeared at the door yesterday, this time Tom Ford Ombre Leather. I received the Parfum a little while ago in a freebie pack from Bloomingdales, so nice that now I can directly compare the original against the new Parfum. Did a couple spritzes this morning of the original EdP and WOW is this one a strong one. Definitely get a bomb of cardamom but that leather is obviously front and center. Interested to see how it dries down, not sure this is one I'd want to be smelling like on a date night, much less at 9am, but at the price point TF frags are, not sure I'd ever even need to make that decision!

Tuesday February 8th, 2022
Razor : Merkur 37c
Blade : Bic SP (7)
Brush : Rudy Vey Custom Plisson
Pre : Shower
Soap : Canadian Williams Mug
Post : Tom Ford Ombre Leather EdP Sample

PXL_20220208_144501969.jpg​
 
Scuttlesoap said:
Have a great day! Tom Ford Hombre Leather is a fav here - I think Barber Dave and Gearnoir are big fans.
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GearNoir said:
Yessir! I took the dive and found a good deal on the secondary market for Ombré Leather. So good!
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Gotta say, I wasn't the biggest fan of the dry-down either. Will definitely have to revisit at some point but for now, I am not one of the chosen!
 
Continued craziness around the work world. Some fairly large organizational changes were formally announced yesterday which didn't do much to impact my day-to-day but will be interesting to see how it plays out. Rumors are also swirling that merit increases will not change much (2-3%) despite inflation so morale isn't great either, especially with the company continuing to do gangbuster performance and realizing ridiculous margins. Sigh. Time will tell.

Canadian Williams shaves continue to deliver, chased with the OG MJ EdC and feeling fresh despite the compensation rumors. Have a great hump day, friends, thanks for reading.

Wednesday February 9th, 2022
Razor : Schick Krona
Blade : Bic SP (9)
Brush : Yaqi Tuxedo Barberpole
Pre : Shower
Soap : Canadian Williams Mug
Post : Thayers WH and MJ EdC

PXL_20220209_173410664.jpg​
 
I once worked for an organization that had a policy that basically Merit increases were 2% across the board. Then the managers were given the money and discretion to hand it out - but in order to “reward“ some of my superstars and give them more than the 2%, meant someone was getting 1 or 0%.
 
MarkB said:
Hope things improve, Ryan.
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Appreciate it Mark.

GearNoir said:
Ridiculous how that works…innit? 😥
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Yup, and I'm in back office finance so I understand and have seen how this all works - no way to pull the wool over my eyes when I've see how the sausage is made!

Scuttlesoap said:
I once worked for an organization that had a policy that basically Merit increases were 2% across the board. Then the managers were given the money and discretion to hand it out - but in order to “reward“ some of my superstars and give them more than the 2%, meant someone was getting 1 or 0%.
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That's how ours have previously operated too, with a bell curve of performance ratings across the employee base dictating anywhere from 1 to 5%, with most sitting at that 3%. Rumors are that this year, they are going to use the inflation adjustments to "even out" the distribution of employees within a given salary band rather than the performance rating bell curve. What that boils down to is that if you previously were a high performer and are towards the higher end of your peers, you will now be penalized with a small increase and those towards the bottom of the band getting more. Not sure how you do this without completely murdering morale for the high performing individuals, as now there is very little incentive to perform...
 
Fightingillini22 said:
Appreciate it Mark.


Yup, and I'm in back office finance so I understand and have seen how this all works - no way to pull the wool over my eyes when I've see how the sausage is made!


That's how ours have previously operated too, with a bell curve of performance ratings across the employee base dictating anywhere from 1 to 5%, with most sitting at that 3%. Rumors are that this year, they are going to use the inflation adjustments to "even out" the distribution of employees within a given salary band rather than the performance rating bell curve. What that boils down to is that if you previously were a high performer and are towards the higher end of your peers, you will now be penalized with a small increase and those towards the bottom of the band getting more. Not sure how you do this without completely murdering morale for the high performing individuals, as now there is very little incentive to perform...
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It’s ironic that I watched Office Space last night
 
This has been one hell of a slog at work this week - hard to believe it's only Thursday. Typically would be longing for the weekend, but we're doing the "Oh Crap" potty training method that my wife has been reading about and it's not exactly supposed to be fun or relaxing. Have to get through it at some point, though, so looking forward to biting that bullet.

The wife and I are still really enjoying board games, and our local library has had tons of great games we've been working through. We've honed our preferences to lighter games and card games that can easily be played on the couch, but still enjoy some larger table ones like Ticket to Ride and Fantastic Factories. Going to try and head over to our local board game shop at lunch to pick up a copy of Radlands.

Another great Williams & Bic SP shave this morning. Have a great one, friends, thanks for stopping by my journal!

Thursday February 10th, 2022
Razor : Schick Krona
Blade : Bic SP (10)
Brush : Razorock F400
Pre : Shower
Soap : Canadian Williams Mug
Post : Thayers WH & Nautica Voyage EdT
 
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