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Rich's Journal: Adventures with Life and Sharp things

Today I just had to use the beautiful razor fashioned for me by Shawn. I have named this razor “Shawn’s Own” Kamisori owing to the unique nature of the razor.
“How So?” You ask. Well, let me take a moment to tell you. My regular Kamisori measures about 5/8 and weigh in at about 1.2 ounces. Shawn’s Own razor is a full inch and weighs in at 3.3 ounces! Truly a Dreadnaught class razor in the size class of a Wade and Butcher. 24 layers of forge welded 1095 and 15n20 steel shaped in Shawn’s forge for my shaving pleasure! It is a left handed Kamisori which is fine for m6 purposes.
For my own gratification, I did pass the razor across my Jasper under water just to say I did.
I selected Mitchell’s Woolfat and a Greydog Chestnut Badger brush for the trial.
Two glorious passes with no mishaps I did a touchup on the neckle region with the Vector.
Thank you Shawn for a Razor beyond price! This is one I will treasure!

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Majorrich said:
Today I just had to use the beautiful razor fashioned for me by Shawn. I have named this razor “Shawn’s Own” Kamisori owing to the unique nature of the razor.
“How So?” You ask. Well, let me take a moment to tell you. My regular Kamisori measures about 5/8 and weigh in at about 1.2 ounces. Shawn’s Own razor is a full inch and weighs in at 3.3 ounces! Truly a Dreadnaught class razor in the size class of a Wade and Butcher. 24 layers of forge welded 1095 and 15n20 steel shaped in Shawn’s forge for my shaving pleasure! It is a left handed Kamisori which is fine for m6 purposes.
For my own gratification, I did pass the razor across my Jasper under water just to say I did.
I selected Mitchell’s Woolfat and a Greydog Chestnut Badger brush for the trial.
Two glorious passes with no mishaps I did a touchup on the neckle region with the Vector.
Thank you Shawn for a Razor beyond price! This is one I will treasure!

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That is FREAKIN’ GORGEOUS!
@ShawnF never disappoints. 😍
 
Many years ago, my Mom and Dad bought these intricate Shoji Screens with the thoughts of papering them in traditional fashion. Well, that was 1968. Mom talked about this project for as long as I can remember. Well, Mom’s been gone 8 years now and I just finished the first batch of them. Just final trimming remains and that has to wait for the paper to draw up properly. I don’t really understand why this paper contracts after it gets glued, but, here it is.

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2026 arrived with a bit of disappointment, the Ohio State Buckeyes didn’t score enough points to win their Cotton Bowl bid. That’s 3 New Years Eve bowls games in a row! It was a great season and the Miami Hurricanes played a terrific game. I wish them well. As I reflect on the highs and lows of 2025, it was a pretty good year on the whole, but not without its challenges. My wife Kristi successfully won her fight with Cancer, and we celebrated with a once in a lifetime adventure to Japan. We made some wonderful new friends, enjoyed meeting some face to face, and held some close to our heart as they loosed this mortal coil. Heaven is indeed enriched by their presence.
Today I used some Ohio State inspired software with a Rockwell T2 and look forward to my new word, the Semiquincentennial, Bisesquicentennial, or simply America250. I hope this year comes with interesting events as I vividly remember 1976.
My wish for my brothers and sisters of the Cadre is more of the good things and less of the things we gladly leave behind in this glorious new year!

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“Today I used some Ohio State inspired software with a Rockwell T2 and look forward to my new word, the Semiquincentennial, Bisesquicentennial, or simply America250. I hope this year comes with interesting events as I vividly remember 1976.“

I’m going to need to become more acquainted with “Semiquincentennial”. That's a great word. I spent the Bicentennial in Yellow Springs, Ohio, as a good friend (to this day) was going to Antioch. I was at the Defense Information School in Indianapolis, and a terrific USAF woman and I got a ride to and from there for the weekend. We had a blast: played softball, attended a picnic, and enjoyed Yellow Springs’ fireworks show that night. In fact, we enjoyed fireworks in the morning and the night. It was an all American kind of day. Sweet memories. 🇺🇸

Kudos for papering your mother’s screens. That must be very satisfying. ❤️
 
January 8th marks the birthday for Elvis and David Bowie. Some years apart, but I found that Bowie was a big fan of Elvis. I themed my shave with gear both of these men might have used. I reckoned that both would likely have used Gillette Superspeeds and maybe a nice period soap like Yardley, followed up with Lucky Tiger. I took a small side trip to try some poverty era gear that Elvis almost certainly knew of during the depression in Tupelo, and Bowie would have benefited with in his pre-Ziggy days. I experimented with reviving a long-dead Gillette Blue using a straight sided glass tumbler, and a Kanner’s stropper. I was surprised to find with little effort I was able to get the blade almost acceptably sharp. I am sure with a bit more glassing, I could possibly get an acceptable edge. I don’t know how good Blue’s were but their carbon steel certainly could theoretically be kept sharp for a long time. I only did a partial pass for fear of tetanus. Finished using a Gillette Platinum.
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EMG06 said:
Very cool! Did you pick it up while in Japan? Or is it something you were able to source here in the USA?
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I found it on Amazon. You have to be careful to get the right width.i got a roll of ~22” wide because while this set of screens was~11” wide, the next set are much larger at ~15” wide. There are 11 and 22 inch paper rolls. You just have to be sure yo7 get the real deal paper. Pretty common to pick it up in Japan, but then I would have had to carry it around
 
A pretty good shave with a pretty old straight and a good soap that doesn’t get as much play as it used to. We’re talking good ol’ Ghost Town Barber! The razor was adequate, but will likely need a bevel reset to be as good (or XLNT) as it could be.

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Today I used “Cow Town” a nice soap from the 2025 Ohio Wetshavers Meetup Shavers Meetup. Coupled with a 1965 Gillette Slim and a Gillette Platinum blade I got out with an excellent shave. Today I was musing on what revolutionary soldiers did to pass time in camp. I know they played cards, and there was plenty of time for gear maintenance. And Lice removal (nit picking). And in winter, I find they may have played Shinny, an ancestor of modern Hockey. It was played with a ball, or a rock. And sticks. And rules as varied as the imagination of the men on the ice. It’s unclear if they had skates, but if they had them I’m sure they could get them on the local economy.

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Rich - so nice to scroll back a handful of pages and get re-acquainted with your wonderful writing! That advent calendar of soaps is wild...and oh my, that Kamisori is stunning!
 
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