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Strop Dragging My Journal Around...
- Thread starter Strop Dragging
- Start date
The doorknob was a real bonehead situation! I think I would have dealt with it in a way more calm and logical manner if the circumstances were different...but I was already pushing it time wise by shaving that morning. So when I went to open the door and found it wouldn't...I was already a tiny bit behind schedule. I could have caught the train I was taking to my brother's...but only just.
So it was a bit of a panic...especially as I was in my room, where I do not have any tools! The doorknob had been loose for some time...and it turned out that it had loosened to the point where the mechanism wasn't coming into contact with the bolt...so, ironically, trying to take it apart with my fingers was the exact opposite thing to do...I should have been tightening the screws instead. If I hadn't been pressed for time, I also would have assessed the situation and taken the actual knob off before doing anything...but as it was, I was trying to undo the screws (with my fingers) while the knob was still on...which created an impasse situation at a certain point.
Long story short, after briefly imagining trying to pop the hinges off without a hammer...I found the release under the knob and got it off so I could take the whole mechanism apart...and then manually pull the bolt. A relaxed, unrushed person would have figured out how to dismantle it immediately...but I was not that person. ?
So, I delayed our timing getting out of the city...which wasn't really that big a deal...but an annoying way to start a "relaxing" weekend away.
With that horrible start to my long weekend out of the way, I had an amazing and fun time with my family camping. I live in a neighbourhood that is very close to the area where eery year on Labour Day weekend, Toronto holds an annual Air Show. It has been the bane of my existence for 15 or so years...the last long weekend of the summer marred by feeling like I'm living in a war zone. Any break from that is worth 20 minutes of stress thinking you won't be able to get out of your room except via the 3rd floor window.... ?
Yes...a far more pleasant noise...
So it was a bit of a panic...especially as I was in my room, where I do not have any tools! The doorknob had been loose for some time...and it turned out that it had loosened to the point where the mechanism wasn't coming into contact with the bolt...so, ironically, trying to take it apart with my fingers was the exact opposite thing to do...I should have been tightening the screws instead. If I hadn't been pressed for time, I also would have assessed the situation and taken the actual knob off before doing anything...but as it was, I was trying to undo the screws (with my fingers) while the knob was still on...which created an impasse situation at a certain point.
Long story short, after briefly imagining trying to pop the hinges off without a hammer...I found the release under the knob and got it off so I could take the whole mechanism apart...and then manually pull the bolt. A relaxed, unrushed person would have figured out how to dismantle it immediately...but I was not that person. ?
So, I delayed our timing getting out of the city...which wasn't really that big a deal...but an annoying way to start a "relaxing" weekend away.
With that horrible start to my long weekend out of the way, I had an amazing and fun time with my family camping. I live in a neighbourhood that is very close to the area where eery year on Labour Day weekend, Toronto holds an annual Air Show. It has been the bane of my existence for 15 or so years...the last long weekend of the summer marred by feeling like I'm living in a war zone. Any break from that is worth 20 minutes of stress thinking you won't be able to get out of your room except via the 3rd floor window.... ?
Yes...a far more pleasant noise...
Shave #223
Razor - Premier "Masterpiece"
Brush - vulfix badger
Soap - Henri et Victoria Chestnut L'Orange
After - Stirling Barbershop balm
Well, for the fun of it, I decided to take this razor and give it a few light laps on the 12K Naniwa and then a couple gentle Tomo slurry laps on the JNAT. (The tomo being the upside to a piece of my JNAT coming off...)
After a good stropping, the Premier was in great shape!
This was a very nice shave...but with this recent foray into safety razors, I am aware that a few of the tough stubble areas on my face (particularly those pesky, wirey blonde ones on the edge of my upper lip) need a really sharp blade to get perfectly BBS...and that is not always in my wheelhouse as a honer. Yet.
But despite that, this was a nice shave, and with a bit of the Stirling Barbershop balm afterwards, I felt like a million bucks. Can't complain!
Onward and shaveward...
Razor - Premier "Masterpiece"
Brush - vulfix badger
Soap - Henri et Victoria Chestnut L'Orange
After - Stirling Barbershop balm
Well, for the fun of it, I decided to take this razor and give it a few light laps on the 12K Naniwa and then a couple gentle Tomo slurry laps on the JNAT. (The tomo being the upside to a piece of my JNAT coming off...)
After a good stropping, the Premier was in great shape!
This was a very nice shave...but with this recent foray into safety razors, I am aware that a few of the tough stubble areas on my face (particularly those pesky, wirey blonde ones on the edge of my upper lip) need a really sharp blade to get perfectly BBS...and that is not always in my wheelhouse as a honer. Yet.
But despite that, this was a nice shave, and with a bit of the Stirling Barbershop balm afterwards, I felt like a million bucks. Can't complain!
Onward and shaveward...
Getting Caught up Brad, Good Stuff
RETURNING TO THE SCENE OF THE SHAVE…
Is there a prize for the longest gap between posts? By my count, I’m coming in just under the 8 year wire. Absolutely absurd.
Why in the hell would I come back to post now? It is a fair question for certain, and one I might manage to work out as I write. But to paraphrase that Nobel prize winning poet Robert Zimmerman…Cadre, you’ve been on my mind.
I think I have taken a somewhat circuitous route back to this online journal, that I believe may have started when some form of social media (don’t they all seem to blur into one hellscape of mostly unwanted “content”?) kicked up a video of someone sharpening a kitchen knife on what looked, to my somewhat trained eye, to be a Japanese natural stone. It stuck in my brain for a few days, lingering in a way that gently demanded attention.
I found myself thinking about the somewhat long-retired JNAT under my sink, discovering that I could not recall what kind of stone it was. This is the kind of memory gap that can drive a person like me to distraction, and so I found myself scrolling back through my old instagram posts to see if I had given a detailed description in any of the many pics I posted of it, most of them with some beautiful vintage straight resting on top or beside, waiting to be inexpertly honed. No dice.
And then I remembered that a very detailed account of my misadventures with honing existed out in the virtual ether of the internet…on that other site. Some surfing and searching brought results…a shave by shave journal covering 3 or so years of my life, starting about 10 years ago.
I thought I would just quickly scroll until I found the the descriptor in question (Asagi!), but, of course, I ended up reading through most of my journal…and then, of course, remembering that it very briefly continued on this site when an exodus of shaving compatriots ended up here.
What a wild experience it was, seeing my almost day to day life of a decade ago glimpsed through the specific prism of a new and all-encompassing hobby/obsession. My journal was always filled with personal details outside of my shaving journey - trips, loves, gigs, work, friends, music etc etc - and it was a rather nostalgic few hours down the wormhole.
But that doesn’t answer the question of why I would bother to return.
Almost more astonishing to me than reliving that time through my own writing was the reminder of what an incredibly kind and wonderful group of people this community is made up of. The level of support and friendship that I received from the people who I connected with both on B&B and here at TSC was so heartwarming to rediscover. I felt such a rush of gratitude…and perhaps more than one or two pangs of guilt or regret that I essentially dropped off. All of those feelings drove me to sit down and write a journal entry here, as ridiculous as that is.
My life has been a series, as I’m sure all of ours have, of ups and downs since I last posted in 2018 (!). Lots of things on the positive side of the ledger, including that the girlfriend I often posted about flying to visit as we traversed the craziness of a long distance relationship (usually referred to as my special lady, in a nod to the Big Lebowski) is now my wife. I also managed, after decades of making music as a collaborator in other people’s projects (predominantly as a drummer), to make and release an album of my own music for the very first time, completely written and performed by me. Big achievements…both culminations of time, commitment and love. On the other side of the graph, I have been battling cancer for the last 3 years after a diagnosis that came a mere 2 weeks after getting married. So…calling it a roller coaster may undersell it a bit.
I am also very aware that posting on a forum site with a journal that has been inactive for 8 years is not necessarily the best way to reconnect and say thank you to members on this site who were so supportive and encouraging to me in my shave journey - most folks on here won’t know who the hell I am, haha. So I will likely drop in to others’ journals and say a hello and express my genuine gratitude these many years later as I have time.
Razor - Joseph Rodgers & Son
Brush - Stirling Boar
Soap - Razor Emporium Barbershop
Aftershave - same
Colone - H&V Cognac & Cuban Cigar
And I figured I should not post in here without logging a shave! I have long since lost count of enumerating my times with implement in hand…but I have continued to be a vintage wet shaver. My frustrations with honing back in the day did seem to get the better of me, and I have not put blade to stone in many years…although there recently is the tiniest glimmer lighting up an old neural pathway in my brain, telling me I should get back on the stone horse. We shall see.
One of the very unfortunate side effects of the chemotherapy treatments I have done is that I have peripheral neuropathy in my hands (and feet), which is a fancy way of saying nerve damage that mades them tingly and numb. It makes certain things a challenge, including playing musical instruments and holding an unguarded, razor-sharp blade to your neck. Because of that, I have been a bit more of a safety/injector shaver for the last few years, but have not completely abandoned straights. After taking a virtual trip down memory lane with the journal this week, I was inspired to do a full shave (as opposed to cheeks and neck), removing my beard of the last few months.
Perhaps it was the colour of the sun cut flat…Or maybe it’s the weather or something like that… whatever it was, I decided on an old classic. It was the first full face SR shave I’ve done in probably a year…and taking that into account, it was a successful affair, a solid DFS with very little irritation. Not such a hard horse to get back on.
And maybe this journal won’t be, either. I don’t imagine I will be logging shaves on a regular basis - but perhaps I will share the ones that really click... or ones where I have some new gear to be happy over. But I want to check in with the Cadre on a more regular basis - I think I can manage more often than every 8 years. We shall see.
As the old me used to say…. Onward and Shaveward.
Brad
Is there a prize for the longest gap between posts? By my count, I’m coming in just under the 8 year wire. Absolutely absurd.
Why in the hell would I come back to post now? It is a fair question for certain, and one I might manage to work out as I write. But to paraphrase that Nobel prize winning poet Robert Zimmerman…Cadre, you’ve been on my mind.
I think I have taken a somewhat circuitous route back to this online journal, that I believe may have started when some form of social media (don’t they all seem to blur into one hellscape of mostly unwanted “content”?) kicked up a video of someone sharpening a kitchen knife on what looked, to my somewhat trained eye, to be a Japanese natural stone. It stuck in my brain for a few days, lingering in a way that gently demanded attention.
I found myself thinking about the somewhat long-retired JNAT under my sink, discovering that I could not recall what kind of stone it was. This is the kind of memory gap that can drive a person like me to distraction, and so I found myself scrolling back through my old instagram posts to see if I had given a detailed description in any of the many pics I posted of it, most of them with some beautiful vintage straight resting on top or beside, waiting to be inexpertly honed. No dice.
And then I remembered that a very detailed account of my misadventures with honing existed out in the virtual ether of the internet…on that other site. Some surfing and searching brought results…a shave by shave journal covering 3 or so years of my life, starting about 10 years ago.
I thought I would just quickly scroll until I found the the descriptor in question (Asagi!), but, of course, I ended up reading through most of my journal…and then, of course, remembering that it very briefly continued on this site when an exodus of shaving compatriots ended up here.
What a wild experience it was, seeing my almost day to day life of a decade ago glimpsed through the specific prism of a new and all-encompassing hobby/obsession. My journal was always filled with personal details outside of my shaving journey - trips, loves, gigs, work, friends, music etc etc - and it was a rather nostalgic few hours down the wormhole.
But that doesn’t answer the question of why I would bother to return.
Almost more astonishing to me than reliving that time through my own writing was the reminder of what an incredibly kind and wonderful group of people this community is made up of. The level of support and friendship that I received from the people who I connected with both on B&B and here at TSC was so heartwarming to rediscover. I felt such a rush of gratitude…and perhaps more than one or two pangs of guilt or regret that I essentially dropped off. All of those feelings drove me to sit down and write a journal entry here, as ridiculous as that is.
My life has been a series, as I’m sure all of ours have, of ups and downs since I last posted in 2018 (!). Lots of things on the positive side of the ledger, including that the girlfriend I often posted about flying to visit as we traversed the craziness of a long distance relationship (usually referred to as my special lady, in a nod to the Big Lebowski) is now my wife. I also managed, after decades of making music as a collaborator in other people’s projects (predominantly as a drummer), to make and release an album of my own music for the very first time, completely written and performed by me. Big achievements…both culminations of time, commitment and love. On the other side of the graph, I have been battling cancer for the last 3 years after a diagnosis that came a mere 2 weeks after getting married. So…calling it a roller coaster may undersell it a bit.
I am also very aware that posting on a forum site with a journal that has been inactive for 8 years is not necessarily the best way to reconnect and say thank you to members on this site who were so supportive and encouraging to me in my shave journey - most folks on here won’t know who the hell I am, haha. So I will likely drop in to others’ journals and say a hello and express my genuine gratitude these many years later as I have time.
Razor - Joseph Rodgers & Son
Brush - Stirling Boar
Soap - Razor Emporium Barbershop
Aftershave - same
Colone - H&V Cognac & Cuban Cigar
And I figured I should not post in here without logging a shave! I have long since lost count of enumerating my times with implement in hand…but I have continued to be a vintage wet shaver. My frustrations with honing back in the day did seem to get the better of me, and I have not put blade to stone in many years…although there recently is the tiniest glimmer lighting up an old neural pathway in my brain, telling me I should get back on the stone horse. We shall see.
One of the very unfortunate side effects of the chemotherapy treatments I have done is that I have peripheral neuropathy in my hands (and feet), which is a fancy way of saying nerve damage that mades them tingly and numb. It makes certain things a challenge, including playing musical instruments and holding an unguarded, razor-sharp blade to your neck. Because of that, I have been a bit more of a safety/injector shaver for the last few years, but have not completely abandoned straights. After taking a virtual trip down memory lane with the journal this week, I was inspired to do a full shave (as opposed to cheeks and neck), removing my beard of the last few months.
Perhaps it was the colour of the sun cut flat…Or maybe it’s the weather or something like that… whatever it was, I decided on an old classic. It was the first full face SR shave I’ve done in probably a year…and taking that into account, it was a successful affair, a solid DFS with very little irritation. Not such a hard horse to get back on.
And maybe this journal won’t be, either. I don’t imagine I will be logging shaves on a regular basis - but perhaps I will share the ones that really click... or ones where I have some new gear to be happy over. But I want to check in with the Cadre on a more regular basis - I think I can manage more often than every 8 years. We shall see.
As the old me used to say…. Onward and Shaveward.
Brad
Rich - so nice to see you! I hope all is well in your world!
Hahaha - thank you, Mark!
Thank you so much, Chris - very much appreciated.
Good to See you back and congrats
Welcome back. Your chemo side effects mimic mine. I had FOLFOX for mucinous adenocarcinoma back in 2013-14. Best wishes in your cancer fight. 
Holy Crap.... Welcome Back Brad! It sure doesn't seem like it's been that long since you've been here last, but we're always here for you man.
Congrats on the Marriage! I got married as well (2024). I as well dealt with cancer and have had a few surgeries for it in the time you've been gone. So I understand the roller coaster effect that life has.
I understand not wanting to document daily shaves as much anymore, but your journal doesn't have to be about shaving either. If you just want to share what you have going on, that's cool too.
Congrats on the Marriage! I got married as well (2024). I as well dealt with cancer and have had a few surgeries for it in the time you've been gone. So I understand the roller coaster effect that life has.
I understand not wanting to document daily shaves as much anymore, but your journal doesn't have to be about shaving either. If you just want to share what you have going on, that's cool too.
Thank you so much, Dave - lovely to see you again.