After mentioning it a few times to her in passing, my wife finally coughed up the missing Humphreys Alcohol Free Cucumber Melon Witch Hazel Redness Reducing Facial Toner. When I first discovered my pumpkin juice, I thought it could be developed into something like this, by adding vegetable glycerin as a preservative; and, sure as shinola, that's the fourth ingredient: filtered water, aloe barbadensis leaf juice, hamamelis virginiana (witch hazel) water, vegetable glycerin.... Not to put too fine a point on it, but glycerin (glycerol), bisabolol, ethylhexylglycerin, phenoxyethanol (rose essence) are obviously alcohols, technically speaking. You know what they mean by "alcohol free" though: no grain alcohol or isopropyl in the base solution, like other witch hazels.
Maybe it's not just a semantic issue, though. The first thing I noticed, when I applied this atop an oil cleansing prep, was oil coming up to the surface. That's a very alcohol-ish quality. But it became sticky rather than wet-feeling, and I took this as a sign that it would not destroy lather. Also, my hair was standing up most auspiciously. I wouldn't want to shave on something sticky, though, so I stuck to routine, rubbing in some lather by hand and rinsing.
Williams had again lathered up ideally in my palm, without any amendment. Two in a row; I guess I've finally dialed it in. Only took me two entire pucks! :-) I will say this, in defense of my initial failure with this soap: the well water here is clearly less hard in the summer, judging from the lime in the plumbing. I think it's because of the vegetation working hard, upstream in the water cycle. Even though Williams is the one soap that takes the highest responsibility for chelation, and that's always going to be great for your skin, that doesn't necessarily make it the easiest to lather in hard water.
Glycerin, as much as I hate it, is a big part of lathering ease. And I liked how it was working with the oil today, to enhance the oil cleanse chemically, without heat. I tend to look at the skin as an osmotic gradient in aqueous solutions, because glycerin is usually free to blow up my cells through aquaporin, uh, pores. But witch hazel shuts that shit down. I've already noted how the cheap stuff makes high-glycerin soaps more tolerable. That didn't constitute any actual synergy with the lather, the ultimate hydration that needs to be restricted to the very surface of the skin, and especially the hair. This stuff is different. It is better, and worth paying more for.
The 1904 open comb delivered the best shave of its career, bringing the Shark's broken-in edge to an ideal attack, one that felt directed at the root, but safely limiting traction on the skin. Like my best shaves with a Lord Platinum, in the Weishi. The hair was softened to such a degree that it seemed the cut was initiated by flexing into the blade, and finished by tension alignment. All at a safe depth and minimal impact to the follicles. Still a bit of work for me, pushing skin, but a perfect shave.
Of course you know very well, I'm eventually going to squirt some glycerin into my dollar store witch hazel, and mix it with pumpkin juice. The finish here was actually a little on the dry side, prompting me to go back and cleanse with moisturizer after an hour.
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