![\"razoruntitled\"](\"http:\/\/balldiamondball.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/razoruntitled.png\")
<\/p>\nI occasionally succumb to a desire to embrace what my daughter calls “retro”. It comes easy being a codger, but it is also a state of mind.<\/p>\n
Mine is shaving. I was the beginning of the multiblade marketing tsunami, where entire generations were lectured that two blades was far superior to one, complete with animated pictures on television of the second blade neatly slicing the follicle off after it eluded the ever incompetent first blade.<\/p>\n
As two blades went to three and Teflon doo-dads were added, (I think they tried lemon scented for a short while)\u00a0 the process of forced and dictated obsolescence was in full swing.<\/p>\n
At five blades and costs approaching\u00a0 fifty dollars at Costco for a package of replacement blades, I decided to get off the merry go round.<\/p>\n
Rather than go all the way back to my grandfather’s straight razor, which is still in my dresser drawer, having been used for a number of things except shaving under my ownership, I dialed it back to my father’s generation, the safety razor.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I acquired a fine German made razor and a fine English made one, both with heritages of their brands going back a ways. I found a Japanese blade brand which is excellent. I acquired some Italian shaving soap, the requisite badger hair shaving brush and drying stand and commenced my new ritual. (Amazon is a modern wonder)<\/p>\n
What I found was I enjoyed shaving, actually looking forward to it. The equipment was best of breed, like a Waring blender or a\u00a0 DC-3 and did it’s job quietly and competently.<\/p>\n
My cost dropped to 10 cents a week, essentially blade and soap cost , assuming I depreciate the gear over twenty years.<\/p>\n
My forty year old son adopted it, mostly to stop paying a fortune to Gillette.<\/p>\n
So that is my retro quirk. I used to\u00a0 change my own oil and do my own tune ups, but they have either priced or automated that retro hobby out. My last carbureted car was in 1985<\/p>\n
I assume somewhere we all have some little part of us that sticks with a ‘classic’ or old fashioned\u00a0 part of our daily life.\u00a0 I expect it serves to anchor us , to connect us to the saga, to link to people who came before.<\/p>\n
![\"douglas-dc-3-04\"](\"http:\/\/balldiamondball.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/03\/douglas-dc-3-04.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
I occasionally succumb to a desire to embrace what my daughter calls “retro”. It comes easy being a codger, but it is also a state of mind.<\/p>\n
Mine is shaving. I was the beginning of the multiblade marketing tsunami, where entire generations were lectured that two blades was far superior to one, complete with animated pictures on television of the second blade neatly slicing the follicle off after it eluded the ever incompetent first blade.<\/p>\n
As two blades went to three and Teflon doo-dads were added, (I think they tried lemon scented for a short while)\u00a0 the process of forced and dictated obsolescence was in full swing.<\/p>\n
At five blades and costs approaching\u00a0 fifty dollars at Costco for a package of replacement blades, I decided to get off … Continue reading