I’m not as active as I used to be because I spend most of my day at my computer either looking for a job or doing freelance work for others. This is caused a little problem. I’ve passed 200 lbs. I’m just shy of six feet so it’s kind of hard to tell when I’m standing, but when I sit down I definitely have a big belly now.
Most of this is probably due to a lack of exercise and the fact that my morning breakfast consisted of two pieces of toast drowned in butter. That has changed as of today. I’m back to cold cereal and fat free milk. I’ve also started walking more in an effort to help burn off some calories.
Obesity is something that’s on a lot of peoples minds [except in the Marina were everyone is thin and beautiful all the time]. I started to wonder one day why my Dad got skinny as he got older yet everyone else around him was getting fat. Then I did the math. The normal intake for an active person is between 2000-2500 calories a day depending on who you ask. Say you eat a bag of those 100 calories snack whatever past that and don’t burn it off and you do that every day. In a month you’ll have gained a pound, which leads to twelve pounds in a year and if you keep it up five years from now you will have gain 60 pounds. Keep it up for ten years and you have an extra 120 pounds.
It’s that easy to get fat. My Dad was active well into his seventies, drank lots of beer and smoked like a chimney. Heart disease finally did him in at 83, but it happened pretty quick. My Mom on the other hand got less active after I was born and was probably over 350lbs when she died at 80. Also from heart disease, but because she was so overweight. The funeral home actually told me that I better put my hand underneath the bag they gave me that had the box that contained her ashes. It was so heavy that I had to weigh it when I got home. Her ashes weighed in at 10 lbs. My Dad and Grandmother were hardly a pound.
I don’t want to be like that. I like having mobility and the best way to keep that up with with a little bit of exercise. I don’t need to jog. I can just walk and mow my lawn and pull weeds like my Dad did. When I used to do that I was down to 178 lbs. So today I’m making a change because I want to see my daughter grow up and not be a faint memory to her.
Readers, I would like to thank you on behalf of John the Waving Guy. Many of you have made his life happier. Some of you are actually stopping and talking to him and Winston Churchill his dog. This is a great thing to me. You’ve shared my article almost 300 times so far. That makes it the most shared article I’ve written and I can’t think of a better man to have written about.
I even received a comment today that one of the people who waves to him stopped to talk to him and he proudly showed her the article that he had printed out. His sister even wrote to me and told me that before the stroke he was in a Softball league for seniors and was pretty good. I rarely feel like I’m able to do a lot of good, but I think this time I did do something good. I look for him all the time now when I drive past. I saw him working in his front yard yesterday, which for someone who has had a major stroke can be difficult. He just keeps on going and I’m glad some of you have helped make his life a little happier. Now maybe the Chronicle or Examiner will pick this up as a human interest story.
I may be in a small group of people, but I’ve only gone downtown to work, not shop unless by shopping you mean for lunch or occasionally dinner. It’s a heavily compacted place, the parking is terrible so if I need something like say an HDTV, I’m going to Costco or Stonestown or Serramonte where the parking is free and it’s easier to get your purchase to your car.
There is lots of fun stuff to do on Market street, but it’s all on foot. Street parking is a disaster and there are few parking garages which are all expensive, so the current idea of putting a mid-market shopping area has me scratching my head. There is rum0r that J.C. Penny will be an anchor store. If I go there and purchase a bed, how exactly am I going to get it to my car? Will they have people who will move it to the parking garage for me?
I like the suburbaness of the Sunset and Richmond districts. It’s where most of us live and the thought of living downtown is out of the question for me. I have two friends that live downtown. One lives in the equivalent size of a jail cell and the other couple with a plush 2 bedroom condo in SOMA is just a little bigger than my garage. Getting stuff you purchase in and out of a place in this area is ridiculous and usually involves a traffic ticket for double parking.
Taking purchases home on the metro or bus is ridiculous unless it’s shoes or clothing because unless it fits in your lap it becomes a disaster. When my wife and I worked downtown we would only leave work to eat and we usually brought our lunches to avoid the high prices at the local restaurants. We have a restaurant out here in the avenues that has another location downtown the difference? The food costs twice as much downtown because the rents are higher. We don’t even go to the Costco in San Francisco because the traffic is such a pain.
I like downtown, but I’d prefer to work there and grab lunch once in awhile than shop. I enjoy my trips to the Ferry Building when I can get down there, but most of the items there fit in a small grocery bag so I’ll hop on the Metro and get off at Embarcadero. We love taking a trip down to the main library, but only on Sundays when the parking is free if you can find it. These are the kind of shops we need downtown not a new Target at the Metreon which means you have to cross to street to get to the parking garage. I doubt the shopping carts would make it that far. Let’s take the Metreon as an example. It’s failed miserably except for the eating areas and the movie theaters, none of which you have to take home with you. Most of the original stores have left and now Target [albeit a smaller one called CityTarget] is moving in. I’ll have to assume they understand that they’ll only be selling small things that you can carry in your hand or a small shopping bag.
Nearby is the Westfield Mall, mostly clothing, services and food. Mostly stuff that will fit in a shopping bag. So I hope CityPlace keeps this in mind when it’s built. When I was talking to my wife she said she liked the stores downtown, but she only browsed and never bought anything unless it fit in her purse. So this is something I hope happens. Mid market does need a clean up, a big clean up, but there also has to be an incentive for people to go there.
OK, I know I’m going to take some heat from this, but I actually believe that the soccer fields would be better replaced by the artificial turf than keeping the grassy gopher community that’s there now. To me it is a sound safe move that will only affect a very small amount of Golden Gate Park.
I know I sound like a blasphemer for making these statements, but this isn’t the old astroturf. This is fake grass that’s made from 100% recycled materials that doesn’t require the maintenance a true grass field would require and already isn’t getting. First off, grass as we grow in lawns and for playing fields is unnatural. The strains of grass that we grow today are all genetically modified [GMO?] to produce a given result. Golf courses use bent grass which works best at a very short height. You can see what happens when it grows too tall by driving down Sunset Boulevard to see the newly planted patches that haven’t been mown yet. It turns a sickly yellowish brown. Bent grass also requires more frequent mowing and fertilizing which it’s not getting on Sunset Boulevard. There are taller grasses such as fescue and Kentucky blue, but those less water, but more care. Neither of these are suitable for a playing field.
There you have the gopher problem. Pocket gophers and moles are running rampant in the city which is part of the reason you have the predatory birds over the current soccer fields. Those same birds can be found all over the park or any other park in the city because we have such an overabundance of gophers. I was at my daughter’s school yesterday helping take care of the garden area while school is out. they’ve pretty much given up on the lawn because of all the gopher holes. I was finding one every foot. I actually tripped when my foot hit a hole I missed. There are kids who have been playing at the soccer field who have had to be rushed to the hospital because of falls caused by the gopher holes.
The artificial grass is pretty nice looking and is very comfortable to walk across. I have neighbors across the street who have it installed and they don’t have to water it or do anything to it. There is also a soccer/baseball field at South Sunset Playground [with lights and there are houses right across the streets, but no one mentions problems with that] that has the same grass and I would take my young daughter there so she could run around and even when she did fall [she was 2 at the time] there was a bit of a cushiony effect from the turf.
The way it is installed is that first you dig out the dirt and install a barrier that keeps gophers from digging up through it. Then you lay down the grass followed by common sand as a stabilizer and then small rubber pellets made from recycled tires. The grass itself is made from recycled plastic. It’s been such a hit that San Jose has installed in around Santana Row.
Now people have addressed concerns regarding the lighting that’s going in. From the rendition the lights will be facing east/west. The field is roughly 1000′ from the north end of the park and about 600′ from the south end. Most of what is close to it are commercial businesses. Yes, if you have a home nearby there might be a little light leakage, but it wouldn’t be anything like having a spotlight shining in your living room window like I did when Saint Ignatius had there night football game that with the drapes open we didn’t need to turn on the lights in our living room and dining room and we could still hear the noise of the generator because it was so big. The lights at the chalet won’t even be above the trees and wouldn’t need generators because they can be powered off the grid. They could even install solar panels on top to make them more efficient.
Here are some of the environmental concerns I’ve seen stated and I’ll address each one.
Loss of over 55 trees, tall shrubs, and the current grass meadow: 55 trees and shrubs is nothing compared to the number of trees in the park. The added amenities like picnic tables, children’s play structure and new ADA bathrooms are a plus side.
Loss of wildlife habitat: Gophers are the only thing you’ll lose. The hawks will not be affected because there’s lots of gophers available at the polo fields, speedway meadow and the rest of the park.
Installation of artificial turf = compacted soil, gravel, plastic carpet, and waste tires and sand infill: They’re leaving out that the plastic carpet [i.e. artificial grass] and waste tires are recycled and if sand infill is a problem then we need to do away with Ocean Beach because you’ll find more sand infill there than anywhere else in the city. Compacted soil just means no gophers which is a plus in my book.
Increased paving for sidewalks and parking: There already exists sidewalks and a parking lot. Maybe they’ll make the lot bigger, but from what I’ve seen and read that’s not in the plan.
Increased lighting for the sidewalks and parking: I actually see this as a good thing. There would be less mugging and rapes occurring in the park if it had better lighting at night. Hell, the whole Sunset and Richmond districts could use more lighting.
An increase in traffic in the Park and the neighborhoods: If that were to happen, I’m sure the local businesses would welcome that. We’re in the USA, Soccer isn’t as big a sport here as our version of Football. It’s mostly a high school thing.
Decreased available parking at Ocean Beach: See above. The parking at Ocean Beach is only heavy on a hot weekend. I usually see more parking in the park, but that’s usually because of the people who can’t find parking in the Beach Chalet’s parking lot.
Decreased night sky darkness: This is called Light Polution and being a major metropolitan city we already produce so much light pollution that soccer field would be barely noticeable.
Infringement on the wild nature of Ocean Beach: This won’t have any effect on Ocean beach except maybe make the gophers move there. I’ve rarely even seen the soccer field and the night time lights won’t have any effect on Ocean Beach wildlife because aside from the odd bat you don’t have anything out there at night. If anything it’ll keep the coyotes that have moved here a little farther away.
Infringement on the historic context for the Beach Chalet, the Dutch Windmill and the Murphy Windmill: The only thing historic out there is the entrance to the Beach Chalet. Everything else has had a complete makeover. The Murphy Windmill if you look at it on google maps is shown in a torn down state. It’s recently had a complete rebuild and looks very nice. That won’t be affected at all.
Contrary to the Golden Gate Park Master Plan: Technically, according to those who built Golden Gate Park a soccer field is against the GGP Master Plan. I found nothing to support this on their website. There are many things, such as major overhauls that the California Academy of Sciences, DeYoung Museum and Music Concourse received that destroyed the history of that area, but that was fine right? Oh wait, that area makes more money for the city.
Converting to the artificial turf will rid the soccer fields of the pesky gopher pests and make it a safer place for our kids to play soccer. The lighting will add a little bit of night glow to the skies and won’t be a problem for local residents because I don’t know many people who sit looking out their windows at night. There will also be the addition of site amenities such as a children’s climbing structure, picnic tables, benches, bleachers, drinking fountains and trash receptacles. The existing restrooms will also be renovated with new interior fixtures in compliance with ADA requirements. That doesn’t sound like a bad thing now does it? I might actually have a reason to see the soccer fields.
I got a surprise the other day when someone told me that the documentary Remembering Playland At The Beach was available on DVD and at the library. I thought I really didn’t have much to remember about Playland because the only time I got to go was the day it closed, September 7, 1972, which means it was a probably my parents giving in to me wanting to go that they finally agreed that I could go as a birthday present since my birthday was the day before.
Well, it turns out there was a lot to remember that I had forgotten. While I only got to go on the last day and most of the rides were closed by then, I did remember the Funhouse the most, but seeing actual video footage of it made it even more memorable. I loved the slide in there, but never realized that it was actually five stories high. Running through the spinning barrel was a piece of cake and the turntable my Dad and I did a few times just because the idea of sitting on a well polished spinning wooden disc and being flung at the padded wall at high speed just sounded like a lot of fun to a 10 year old kid. One of the people they interview mentioned that OSHA would even let a place like that be built today which is probably true when you see the footage. The trick on the turntable was for everyone to lock arms so it would spin faster before you got thrown.
There were the dodger cars which would give you whiplash when the large metal cars would smash into each other while sparks from the pole leading up to the ceiling to power the car dropped down on your head. Yep, another OSHA cringe moment. It was so large that they could have 80 cars running at once.
I didn’t get to go on the Diving Bell which is what I had always wanted to do, but after seeing the footage and some pictures it probably was a good thing I didn’t. One of the people said that when the bell was yanked back up out of the water everyone felt like they were going to die and from the looks of it, I’m surprised no one did.
The Big Dipper was gone by then, but replaced by the Alpine Racer which was closed down by then. The urban legend that a sailor stood up on the Big Dipper to show off to the girl he was with and got hit by a cross beam getting his head torn off is actually kind of true. He did get hit in the head, but landed in the lap of his girlfriend dead with a crushed skull. Oh and there were no seat belts of any kind back then. Not on most of the rides. I can kind of see why my Mom never wanted me to go there.
Dark Mystery was the only other ride I got to go on that day and I jumped a few times with things popped up and the screams played. I do remember there was one box we passed where cheap aluminum figures of a boy and naked girl popped up which didn’t make me jump, but point and yell to my Dad, Did you see that! I told my Mother all about that when we got home and I can remember a glaring eye shot in my Dad’s direction.
What I had forgotten about were all the concession stands out front. As a kid I always remember stopping for It’s-its, but I had forgotten about the Hot House that sold enchiladas and tamales. I remembered that my Mom would send me and Dad out there on the weekends for enchiladas so she didn’t have to cook for one day.
The history of the place was what I found to be amazing. When you think of amusement parks you think of kids, but Playland at the Beach was different. It was mostly adults going on the rides then and there were plenty of pictures and footage of men in suits and fedoras with their women in dresses and white gloves. Something I never expected to see. There was also a place next to it called Fun Tier Town which was for the kids which had some pretty timid rides. It was a big spot for kids to have birthday parties, but I believe it closed down earlier because there was one birthday party I was supposed to go to there and they were already closed and that was before Playland shut down.
It was the Whitney Bros who made the place the most popular, but after George Whitney died and his son George Whitney, Jr. took his place that there started to be family troubles and Playland was sold to it’s final owner in 1970. This person unfortunately didn’t really know how to run an amusement park, especially one that was fogged in with salt air constantly so the whole place fell apart quickly leading to it’s closure in 1972.
What amazed me in the footage was that they had footage from the early 60’s before the civil rights era started and yet you saw white kids, asian kids and black kids all playing together without a care. It really was just a little bizarre to see.
During it’s heyday Walt Disney was traveling around to all the amusement parks and talking to the owners to see what worked and what didn’t. Walt really liked a lot of what Playland was doing. So much so that Walt hired George Whitney, Jr. to help him build Disneyland. Several of the attractions at Playland were the inspiration for Disneyland rides.
Today, Playland at the Beach is no more, but luckily there were some fools who went in after the closure and stole as much as they could and put together Playland not at the Beach Museum in El Cerrito. Several of the people interviewed run the museum and from what I’ve seen they’ve saved a lot of the old arcade games and maybe added to them as well. I’ll have to put that on my list of places to visit now. The Carousel has been refurbished and is now at Zeum at Yerba Buena Gardens. One Laffing Sal is at the Musee Mecanique at Pier 41, the other is at Playland not at the Beach in El Cerrito.
If you remember Playland, you definitely need to see this video. If you have a love of amusement parks you should see this as well. It wasn’t like Disneyland, but it was definitely a San Francisco landmark.
When my Mom was alive she couldn’t mow the lawn and wanted to get rid of the old behemoth electric mower we had. She found a great gardener who was only charging $15 and he’s come and mow the lawn every other week. Then his prices started to go up until they were $30 each time and he’s only show up sometimes once a month. He wasn’t really doing anything else like fertilizing the lawn so there were weeds taking over and we decided to make a change.
I had used the old electric mower, but hated having to deal with the bag after wards and the fact that a lot never made it into the bag and sprayed all over the sidewalk. I had read up on reel mowers and found that if you mowed and just left the cut grass on your grass that it would break down adding more nitrogen to your soil meaning less fertilizer which is one of the things grass needs the most. So we went ahead and plunked down $60 on a low end reel mower by American Lawnmowers. From the reviews they said that if you have anything growing too tall it won’t cut them and they were right. We have several weeds that are about 8″ long that just got pushed over and not cut so I had to pull those by hand.
We also had some other flat weeds that were the type that you could grab the weeds in hand and twist them around and get the root out. I did that first before starting to mow. Well I have to say that after smoothing out the piles of dirt the gophers dug up and pulling the weeds my wife estimated that it should take me about a half hour. When she says a half hour she always undercuts it expecting me to take longer so she can come out and ask me what I’m doing out there [Kind of like your Mom when you’re a teenager int he bathroom for too long].
Total time was less than 15 minutes and I actually felt a bit of a burn in my arms afterwards and was a little out of breath. Remember, I’m not an athlete and typically work desk jobs so this was a good work out for me. The results weren’t the best, but at the same time the lawn is studded with all kinds of grasses since the sod that was originally laid down wasn’t top shelf stuff and our neighbors have let their lawn turn into a veritable weed factory next door, but I’m suspecting with a little weed and feed and continued effort that within a month things will be looking better. from my research the grass we have is fescue and other cool weather grasses so we should let it grow to about 3″ before cutting it and cut it down to about 2″. I was a little quick on the cut this time because while there were sections that were 3″, there was a lot that were barely an inch.
Reel mowers are not not known for doing edging very well, but we don’t have a fence on any sides and only have a bout 2′ of brick wall that makes it difficult so that wasn’t really a problem. I found that if I started cross ways and then when lengthwise it was easier, but I think next time I’m going to do cross and lengthwise all the way across. I’ll get a better work out and then maybe I can pull out an old chaise lounge and a cooler full of beer and sit and talk with the neighbors about our front yard gardening. I also noticed last night that our automatic sprinklers had some wrong heads installed. There are wide and thin shot heads and with our lawn they could have been wide shots installed in the corners instead of wide on the sides and shorts on the ends. I’m going to have to make a trip down to Urban Gardeners nearby and ask them how to fix this since I don’t want to tear up the whole lawn and put new sod down and re-do the sprinkler system. While I can do simple plumbing, when plumbing and landscaping come together count me out.
My wife and I took a trip to the local produce market and realized something about San Francisco when you go shopping. Parking sucks. After a trip to Costco the other day where they expect you to make large purchases, ergo vans, trucks and SUV’s I understand why now. San Francisco doesn’t understand that cars have gotten bigger.
My Nissan Altima which I love doesn’t have fold in rear view mirrors. I wish it did though because I’d have almost a foot walk between cars. I literally have to suck in my gut which isn’t that big and I still have my butt shoved up against the other persons car.
When we had a Dodge Intrepid [which my wife used to refer to as the U.S.S. Intrepid because it was so huge] we bought it used and I asked the dealer selling the car why some of the inside rubber for waterproofing was a bit worn and he showed me by getting out of the car in a tight space. It’s basically because people are rubbing their butts against the rubber siding trying to get out in a tight space.
While I won’t call myself skinny I’m only a few pounds overweight, but I can’t imagine how some very overweight people can get out of their cars to shop. The obvious thing to do would be to widen the spaces, but unfortunately we have a lot more people in the city which means a lot more cars. Maybe they could angle the non-parallel spots to a full 90°. That would at least allow for extra space, but might make things difficult for people to learn how to do. For me, that wouldn’t be a big deal because I have to do that every time I pull into my driveway.
Two SUV’s parked next to each other is a real comedy of errors to watch because the people are trying to be very careful getting out of the car without slamming their door into the car next to them and it’s even more fun to watch when there are people in both cars because they end up in a stare down waiting to see who hits the other car first. I’d love to say I have a good answer for this, but that’s not my job. That’s the job of the Board of Supervisors to handle and last time I checked I wasn’t one of them.
I thought I was over it a year ago. Gophers destroyed our lawn as well as our neighbors with tunnels moving 4 houses away. How did I know this? My first line of defense was the gopher bomb which is basically a large smoke bomb that you light and stick down the hole. Smoke started coming out of the grown four houses away in both directions.
We tried to be nice and use all the other ethical humane ways to get rid of them, but the holes kept coming back and back again. They even started to show up in our backyard that a smoke bomb verified that they were so intrenched that they had actually dug under the houses foundation to our back yard over 40 feet away.
None of it worked. So it was time to go all medieval on them because we had lost half our lawn to them. Most of the pellets never worked and I finally had to resort to seeds that had a cyanide coating on them. These would suggested by one of the several hardware stores who felt my pain and warned me to make sure that they went into the hole and nothing was left out because you didn’t want to start poisoning cats and dogs in the neighborhood. I even asked my dog owning friends if they had any gopher chasers, but that was to no effect.
After a couple of weeks of watching the gophers poke their heads at me from the holes they finally disappeared. I don’t know if it worked or not, but now we had what was our lawn back. We had some extra money and decided to try and reseed the lawn with some patch restoring stuff from Home Depot. I was skeptical because I had used it before and nothing worked. This time it did and what grew back was wonderful. It looked better than the sod that we had installed many years ago that’s gone over to mostly more weeds than grass due to our neighbor who rents his house out and doesn’t give a damn about his lawn and maybe come once every six months to trim the weeds down.
Now the gophers are back or at least one gopher because the damage is not as bad as before as you can see from the picture. Just to give you a little bit of history to go with this, when these homes were built there were two strips of green either side of the walkway into the house. By law you were required to have these areas planted and keep up in a nice neat fashion. This was why Dads would be out mowing the lawns on Sundays and then drinking themselves silly after they finished. That was how the old boys club worked in the Sunset district.
With the water shortage in the 70’s the city lifted several laws to conserve water and several people ripped out their lawns and put in concrete or the even more hideous white dolomite rock. Our neighbor on the corner, Mr. John Mass had the lawn on the block that he was the proudest of. He would manicure that like a golf course and never was a gopher seen on his lawn. Dogs would not even pee or poop on his lawn there was just something magical about how perfect it was. I always wanted a lawn like that.
Now I have the gophers again and I’m thinking of starting to douse the lawn with lots of weed and feed and just kill off as many weeds as possible and hopefully the gophers will go away before I have to get medieval on my end again. Then I’ll find a way to get an even larger bag of that seed mix and start all over again. If any of you out there have some sure fire remedies for getting rid of the gophers let me know [no I will not stand out there and pee down the hole as someone once suggested to me.] I’m willing to try ethical treatments as well as long as you can find one that works.
Originally a U.S. Army post built in late 1800’s for coastal defense during the Civil War [good job guys!], Fort Mason expanded in 1912 to include docks and storage for shipping overseas soldiers and equipment for wars. It hasn’t really changed too much since then since it was finally decommission and handed over to the National Parks Service in the 1970’s.
While there have been some minor improvements, it’s still pretty much storage facilities except for the few rooms that can be rented out for events, Greens, The Blue Bear School of Music and the Italian American Museum. I’m sure there’s more there, but I just haven’t come across it other than attending a meeting of the San Francisco Aquarium Society a few months ago and attending traffic school there several years ago.
The buildings are starting to look rather worn out though and something needs to be done to bring these 13 acres of land to be more useful to the city other than a parking place for Off-The-Grid food trucks every Friday night. Now Fort Mason Revisited has asked 20 design firms to come up with designs to revamp the place and I say good for them. Yes, there’s lots of historical nature to the place having been used by the military during all the wars up to and including the Korean War, but it now needs a big change to serve the people of San Francisco.
Of the 20 firms selected, they have until June 15 to say whether or not they’re in and then three of the firms will be selected to start work this summer. There’s no telling what will come of the place, but I hoping for the best. Wouldn’t it be great if we could have a place that’s built off of modern designs with added solar and wind power to electrify the place. The city is also in the process of trying to extend the F line to Fort Mason through an unused rail tunnel in upper Fort Mason. I think that would be a good idea and I believe they should retain some of the nautical themes that have been in place so it coincides with all the boats docked next to it.
I talked about old school shaving once before and I on Saturday I received my shipment of old school equipment. San Francisco has it’s fair share of high priced shaving stores such as Art of Shaving, L’Occitane and Nancy Boy [really? You all know that’s a British euphemism for a gay guy]. I went even more old school and for $50 I managed to get shipped to me a full on old school shaving kit.
I received a Weishi 9306c butterfly double edged razor with 5 Dorco blades in a case, a British made badger bristle brush [a preferred style] and a 3.75oz bar of Col. Conk’s shaving soap. West Coast Shaving delivered quickly and at a good price. I am very happy with the products I received and can now begin to feel more manly in the mornings when I shave.
To switch over to a safety razor takes a bit of getting used to. You don’t shave the same way you do with the multi-blade or disposable razors. It takes a bit more finesse, but in the long run will save you a lot more money. First off a blade will last you a week or two and only costs you about 10¢ or less if you know where to shop. The shaving soap will last you a year if not more so after your initial investment figure you’ll be spending about $6 a year to shave versus what I was paying which was over $6/month for Fusion shaving gel and 5 bladed razors.
Now let’s talk about the products. The Weishi 9306c is modeled after the 1959 Gilette safety razor and is a gun metal black, not blue and has a lot of weight to it [can you say heavy metal razor?] It feels good in my hand and it has a really beautiful old school look to it. When I put the first blade in I realized something I hadn’t realized in years — Razor blades are f*cking sharp! I actually scraped off a bit of my finger nail when I accidentally hit the edge of the blade and have a small cut on my finger because I was a bit sloppy getting it out of the paper wrapping [judging sharpness of a blade usually suggests scraping it against your finger nail at a 90° angle]. Once I had it in the razor and clamped it down things were fine.
Something you have to consider when you go back to old school shaving is that the paper and blade that you use with a safety razor are fully recyclable. The soap that you lather up with doesn’t come from a can and it usually very earth friendly glycerin based so you’re not polluting our waters and not supplying more metal to recycle if you remember to even toss the can in the recycle bin and not in the trash. Then there’s the brush which I found out was not made from the hair of slaughtered badgers or boars, but is actually shaved off the animals once they are sedated so they can grow back more hair to be shaved again [because honey badgers don’t take sh*t from nobody!] Pretty nice deal for my animal loving friends.
Now let’s get down to the shave. One of the things I first remembers from years ago was that after letting the brush soak in hot water and then applying it to the soap is that the I was actually getting hot lather on my face. Canned shaving gel/soap is always cold. There have been products to warm it, but they never quite work and then there are those that add chemicals to add warmth to the gel/soap that probably aren’t the best for the environment. The soap lathers up richly and covers my faces thick and efficiently. Now it’s time to bring in the tool of Sweeny Todd. Well, maybe not the same as that was a straight razor since this is a safety razor, but you still have be careful as you have more chance of cutting yourself that with a more expensive disposable blade. Keep the blade at a 45° angle and start your first shave with the grain of your beard. I being someone who never had to use a safety razor aways shaved against the grain to get done faster and have a hair and skin composition that this works well with. You’ll probably have to do a second pass, but if you’re a beginner with DE safety razor’s this version of the Weishi 9306c is a good choice. It is very forgiving. It was so forgiving that after the second pass I grabbed the old fusion razor to finish up to a baby’s butt smooth finish, so next time I’ll try against the grain again. Next time I try it I will take the risk of going against the grain since while I have somewhat sensitive skin, I have a light beard.
After your first attack you’ll have to lather up again and go for a second pass. Now depending on your face and hair texture you can go against the grain for a smoother shave. I have baby’s butt skin and not too course hair so I am lucky. After I’ve shaved you could lick my face and not feel a rough spot anywhere [not that I’m asking for anyone to do that.] The upper lip and chin or goatee area of the face take a little more work, but once you get the hang of it you’ll get them all smooth. I was surprised at the number of videos on youtube.com on how to shave with a safety razor, but I have to say that they helped me a lot.
First time, two passes and I’m baby butt smooth. Afterwards I splash on a bit of witch hazel as an after shave since it doesn’t sting and rinse the smell off then add a finishing moisturizer to seal off my skin and keep my skin looking better than some people in their 20’s.
While it may not be for everyone there is just something about the feeling of going old school in the shaving realm and if it ends up cutting your cost of shaving to less than a 1/10 of what it was with the mass market products which will give you money to spend on other things then I say go for it. I would also suggest getting a sampler pack of various blades as each person’s face deals with a blade differently.
I’m not as active as I used to be because I spend most of my day at my computer either looking for a job or doing freelance work for others. This is caused a little problem. I’ve passed 200 lbs. I’m just shy of six feet so it’s kind of hard to tell when I’m standing, but when I sit down I definitely have a big belly now.
