• 12 Posts
  • 86 Comments
Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: June 13th, 2023

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  • I tossed in a different thumbnail on the straight razor sub because I was a bit sick of it being the same image but I’ve not the level of interest in photography your SotD photos clearly exhibit so I’d be happy to see you swap out the super generic banner if you’d still be interested. Also not partial to the thumbnail I chose beyond the general idea that they not be the same thing and that it’d be kind of neat if the thumbnail showed the grind of a razor toe-on as the spine-as-honing-guide is very core to what makes a straight razor.



  • Oh neat, didn’t know they did a titanium one. Was it just that special edition or did it become a regular product at some point?

    Unfortunately I think the best we can do with the situation is appreciate that they ever bothered to make the machined ones and that they are almost certainly subsidised by the zamac. Which is also why the price isn’t that far apart: few would buy the machined one if they sold it at the same margins as the zinc alloy.

    It really is exhausting though. Every time I make a purchase decision I have to be skeptical because I might be getting the zamac-with-fancy-handle version of whatever product or service I’m trying to buy. Avoiding that takes time which is how they sell all this junk at a high margin. Especially with how we’ve integrated almost every facet of life into the economy. Contributes a bit to a sense of despair. So I try to appreciate the people that do sincere work and, instead of being frustrated by it, try to consider the time it takes to winnow the quality offerings from the grift as doing my part to signal a better direction for society.








  • My honing enthusiasm provided too much rationalisation for razor acquisition and so I have …several. The winnowing process is ongoing and I’m proud to have sold 5 x 5/8 last week.

    6/8 is harder because I like them more. Lately I’m wondering: Do I really need two 6/8 hollow-but-stiff round point French blades?

    I’m partial to the Grelot. I do appreciate that it’s a bit more hollow and as a Canadian I enjoy the etch. Plus it’s my only nice Grelot and there’s some cachet there. And it’s in better shape. But there’s just something to the TI and it’s similarly my best TI and the pitting isn’t anywhere important so just sorta adds character. And it’s more towards a quarter hollow so …sort of a different thing altogether?

    Inconclusive. More study required. Luckily they don’t take a lot of space.

    Also: I’m always curious to see the grind toe-on every time I see a picture of a straight razor and that shot should somehow always be included in the metadata or something :)



  • Ha, my first strop made it through unscathed. My first nick was on my second strop once I’d had it a while and gotten complacent. Complacency is what really kills strops so I look at it as meditation and try to be present with it, and indeed whenever I’m waving a fragile and very sharp edge around.


  • I prefer a 2.5" strop. You should be doing a lightly rolling X stroke anyway to ensure good contact and many straight razors aren’t quite straight so it’s useful to be able to hang the tip off a bit if it’s subtly bent. Plus on my 3" strop it sorta bothers me that there’s this whole area on the toe side not getting any wear. Maybe if it was a reversible design so I could rotate it as I go…



  • @walden@sub.wetshaving.social had a good guess with the metal dust. Maybe lead if they’re making wedges there as well or who knows what randomly toxic stuff they were using at that point to dress the leather in stropping wheels and whatever other process they had. Seems lung related somehow though since fans made the difference. I did actually try searching archive.org for that “Fourth Report of the Children’s Employment Commission” back before it got hacked but wasn’t able to find anything.


  • I would be sad as I enjoy this little corner of the server. If you look at the front of this sub it’s a well curated (ha I’m biased) collection of interesting tidbits on this topic of some fascination to me and I feel like I’m building on something when I post to it. Whereas if I put it on the main page it’s there for a bit then it vanished into the sea of daily and misc threads. And I also find it gratifying that at least a couple of others have gotten the spirit of it and posted things that fit right in.

    Doesn’t bother me at all that it operates on a scale of weeks and months and this feels more fun than a blog though I suppose it’s verging on one. I think it’s fairly discoverable too because you’ll see these posts when you’re viewing the local feed and most who are interested in the sort of thing that’s here will have subscribed. This checks out since the main sub has 11 users/day, 36/week and yet this post from 7 hours ago already has 10 points.

    So I don’t know about varied subs in general but I feel attached to this one.