Spring Desquamation

I don't always feel like shaving close. (But when I do, I shave with a Tech or Super Speed.) Once again I can't seem to trust my instincts, because I can SEE a mask of stratum corneum lying dull on my face, after a late beard reduction with a shavette and Dove Expert Shave. I was all like MacConaughey in the car advertisement, with my fancy brush and wet schmeer of a lather. But I forgot to wet my face first, and that's probably where the electro-harmonica trance music would have changed to the Sanford & Son theme, if I were selling anything.

Fact is, I only picked up this junky Fromm razor to try a different type of blade. It has the typical piece of black plastic for a tail that I absolutely HATE compared to the Sedef's dentate aluminum. But that one has plastic scales that swing loosely around the pin, so I guess you can't really win for under $10. At least the ejector knob didn't seem to get in my way, which was a concern, as it doesn't really appear to have been designed for shaving as much as hair cutting.

Indeed, I liked the blade pretty well, the Personna hair shaper blade. I could see myself with a Monsieur Charles. Way more easily than I could see investing in a straight razor. I was getting some sliding action in there, thanks to the rounded corners. But again, this was just to remove a beard before it could destroy a pillow, 2x WTG. I know better than to try anything fancy with an open blade, since learning the hard way last time. Alum picked up a couple errors this time, too. But, considering the drying lather and the fact I still don't know how to maneuver the thing, I was clearly more successful at avoiding injury.

The only blood was from a little bathroom biopsy I had performed beforehand, on the remnant of my cheek keratosis. It's definitely coming up, but I think it got hung up on some vascular structure, which kind of looked like an ingrown hair, so I gave it a good poke with a lance. I guess it was sort of an internal scab, from when I scraped at it with a fingernail. Which I seem to have to do, to get the exfoliation sometimes. Might leave a little scar.

Maybe the potential inflammatory repercussions of shaving it off are the basis of my feelings. Allowing the horny layer to build up in winter had those kind of repercussions, and my instinct was to shave that the hell off.

Another interesting observation from the past week was when the tumor's formerly yellow striae were exfoliated like hair. I'd see this little white wisp projecting from the shrinking bump, and scrape it off, only to see a little more peeking out. Pretty cool. That thing was starting to bug me.