Fediverse Wetshaving Celebration - 9. March 2026
- Brush: Omega Roma Colossea 31 mm
- Razor: Razorine Flatboy
- Blade: BIC Chrome Platinum
- Lather: Southern Witchcrafts - Valley of Ashes
- Post Shave: Southern Witchcrafts - Valley of Ashes
- Music: Cocteau Twins Mix
2 passes on both the dome and the face around a partial beard. Avoided ATG today, still got a few weepers everywhere due to inconsistent shaving technique and bad blade alignment. Otherwise, nice feeling.
Congratulations to the 1000th daily post! I think this is an amazing feat, even though it's not very active in here and a few friendly members unfortunately don't post anything anymore. We're surely not Reddit and probably never will be (though, if they implement ID verification we could maybe gain a few new users). But I like our little Fediverse corner here.
As for today's shave, it was mostly to test a few things. I currently have a henriquatre again, but I want to go down to a Van Dyke soon once the facial hair is longer - so I needed something that is good with sharp lines and contouring. Unfortunately it didn't quite go as I would've liked, but that's the thing with experimenting: it's a 50/50 chance in the best case.
I kinda wondered why I didn't use this razor much after acquiring it last year and now I know why: like a lot of other Italian full brass razors, it has problems with blade alignment. To the point of if you screw the handle on tight, the blade gets bent sideways. It's also impossible to get both sides of the blade to an even exposure - trust me, I've tried really damn hard for 15 minutes before I gave up and accepted that this thing is essentially poor man's asymmetric razor. The flat head is intriguing for getting really sharp lines for certain beard styles (and perhaps sideburns for those of you who still have their hair, unlike me). And it actually works if the handle isn't screwed down too hard. But at what cost? I was extremely careful going into this shave, avoided going ATG due to some recent bumps/ingrown hairs and yet it still tore those up. Unfortunate, but the truth is: I should have gotten myself a razor with better craftsmanship than this thing. The low price reflects the actual effort that went into it. Shame about the nice uncoated brass...
It also seems like my SW VoA set has gone bad. I only once experienced this before, but the scent isn't as present anymore and has shifted more towards old damp cloth than burning rubber. Especially noticeable on the toner, that stuff was just not cool. It still worked once I loaded the soap like it owed me money, but the experience wasn't the same I'm used to. Pour one out for this unobtainium set 🫗
The best part of the shave was actually the music I had playing in the background. During my goth phase in my teens, I never liked Cocteau Twins. Their dreamy, wavy stuff wasn't quite suited to all my internal insecurity and my dislike of myself and everything around me. The raw energy of other bands was more suitable for this chaotic, rebellious phase. Nowadays, I quite like them. It's similar to Enya (which I quite liked as a child and only re-discovered in my twenties when my music horizons were broadening up again). They don't have any lyrics, sometimes you hear their song titles sung and other times it's like a mashup of different languages your brain seems to recognise (in the mix today, I had the feeling of italian, french, spanish, finnish and even japanese!). They use vocals more like another instrument, which is kinda in tune with Enya (though I remember she used to have real lyrics on some songs and even sang in Tolkien's elvish language). The whole atmosphere of their songs is more like a mix of dream pop, ambient and krautrock instead of typical post-punk/darkwave/goth rock. I mean, look a this video ! It's uncanny how they precede currently popular aesthetics like "dreamcore", a recent favourite of Gen Z and even younger generations, by over 35 years!
