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statistical risk of any shaving
Monday, March 19 2007
Gretchen has been unaccountably glum since recovering from the flu. For my part I've been a little uninspired and partial to the easy pleasures of life such as napping, bagel eating, and bathtaking.
The bath is the place where I usually shave. I recently obtained a set of replacement heads for my Gillette Fusion razor, which is part of my basement bathtub toolkit. These heads of the Gillette Fusion each have five parallel blades and look like tiny Venetian blinds, but I have to admit that they give the gentlest shave I've ever had. Furthermore, the heads seem to last a long time, a good six months at the rate I use them (though I tend to use a razor head until it's no better than a Clovis point).
Since I shave in the bath, I usually do so blind, that is, without any sort of mirror. To compensate for my tendency to miss patches, I go over the whole of my face several times from several different angles, feeling along as I go to discover if the extent of any remaining stubble. The shaves I'm able to obtain this way are not, then, "the best a man can get." But they're good enough. Unfortunately, though, the sheer amount of shaving that goes with every blind shave means that I'm more exposed than average to the little nicks and accidents that are a statistical risk of any shaving operation. I've gotten very good at avoiding these, but with every new shaving technology there's a period of adjustment. And though I've been shaving with a Gillette Fusion for over six months, I still occasionally nick myself with the thing. The first time I did this, I'd forgotten about that sixth blade on the flip side of the razor and somehow managed to slice open my lip. It is with the risk of bleeding that these replacement blades seem to have a rather serious engineering fault. Unlike the first Gillette Fusion head that came with the razor itself, which appeared randomly as a freebie in the mailbox, the replacements feature large swaths done in a deep orange color, a color that is close enough to red to make it difficult for me to see blood when it appears on the razor. Consequently, it's possible for me to nick myself and never become aware of it. And unless I'm careful to check myself in a mirror before going out (something I've done infrequently since turning 35), it's possible for me to be out on the streets looking as though I've just been slashed in the face.
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