"BLACK extreme" eau de toilette was up to bat, seeming to mock my rainbow metaphor, as well as its own extremely clean scent. Catching it in the bottom of the shaving scuttle-bowl was a minimal amount of mineral oil, two drops that didn't even coat the flat center when I tried to smear it around.
On the soap-and-water side, I just eyeballed it with a dip of the tip of my synthetic brush, and it turned out to be quite a lot more water than usual. I surmised the brush would not hold that much of the resulting liquid soap solution, so I just dumped it into the bowl when I thought it was soapy enough, and set to work lathering.
That took quite some time, starting from frothy soup, but it got there, to what I recognized as good ol' good-enough, Williams lather. A little foamier than most soaps, I can tolerate a few large bubbles in the bowl. The extra liquid made this a little more dense, but it looked normal enough going on. When I rubbed it in, though, it changed -- and I've noticed this before, a couple times since my inclusion of mineral oil/EdT. It was quite thick and sticky. Arko-ey?
Rinsing that preshave and lathering again "for real," it was clear that nothing would be contacting my skin, this shave. I shaved the hell out of it. I might have thought the mineral oil was cumulative, but changes were happening in the bowl as well. A long string formed between the bowl and brush as I withdrew it, as if the synthetic had somehow lost a bristle. And the lather on my face looked more like Italian Barber soap, visually.
There wasn't really any point to a third pass, but I found a few more hairs. Now great sheets of film were evident when the lather was stretched apart. I tried blowing bubbles with it, through my thumb and forefinger; it looked like bubble solution. No dice. I added water to the bowl, and could see the goo adhering to the bottom.
A fifth lather was applied as postshave while I cleaned up, which could have passed for Tabac, visually. Not that I had any visible injury to soothe, but I was sure I had shaved very closely, and didn't feel like washing any other body parts. Then there was more to squeeze out of the brush, with the "crema" consistency of Stirling. Nothing to do with it but wash my cloth.
Was it the proportions, or the scent oils? The fact of starting with too much water, then evaporating from the hot scuttle? For whatever reason, things really emulsified thoroughly and effectively. Maybe I need to put a little more time and attention into my lather, is what I'm thinking. It seems Williams has the potential to be anything I could possibly want.
I've switched back and forth between "BLUE deep" and "BLACK extreme," and even when it seemed I got the water excess right, blue didn't do it. Black did, though it wasn't as extreme with the normal quantum of soap solution. It SEEMS like there's a chemical difference, even possibly a reaction between the ingredients.
ReplyDeleteUsing extra virgin coconut oil as the carrier detracted from the scent a bit (maybe should have gone "refined"), but did not disrupt the gooeyness.
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