5. The devil is not always in the details
Some people will tell you there’s no such thing as a stupid question. Those people have obviously never seen the Internet.
Not only is it your shave, but it's your common sense, so use it. There's a difference between being curious about other people's habits and mimicking their every detail. If you haven't cut your fingers multiple times while handling a razor blade, then you probably don't need to ask whether you should be picking it up with your fingers or using tweezers. If you manage to get water on your face without setting the house on fire, then you probably don't need to ask whether you should use your hands or a washrag to get the water on your face. One of my favorite questions is, "How do you hold the towel on your face during your prep?" If your towel keeps falling on the floor every shave then this might be a legitimate question (and you should probably read up on "gravity" ), but otherwise don't worry about it. Remember, you're not shaving to parrot everyone else, you're shaving to get the job done with enjoyment. Don't sweat every tiny detail of your shave.
This always annoys me. It takes both hands to hold the hot towel in place. It also takes two hands to whip up hot lather. So, either my face goes cold, or the lather does. Okay, I can hear you saying "Get a scuttle". But where's the fun in that? And anyway, it doesn't really answer the original question. Surely someone's solved this problem before. But I can't find anyting. So I got to thinking.
I have a sewing machine, but no skill at using it. Here's the plan.
I molded the towel to my face, using safety pins to hold it in place. No, not onto my face. I found it worked better to fold it under my chin before folding the sides. The fold you see at the chin happened when shaping the bottom of the towel against my neck. With all those folds in place, and the towel neatly contoured to my face, it was time to figure out how to hold it in place. Yes, to my face this time. Some stretch band would be perfect, so I hacked up my hanes to get some. Okay, to tell the truth, there was some in the drawers. (pun intended) It obviously needs to be tied at the top near the sideburns, with the tape going over the ears. It also needs to be tied near the bottom with the tape at an upward angle to hold the sides neatly against the neck. One last touch--which I skipped because it's way more than I can handle with a thick towel--is to add a pleat to mold the towel around the adam's apple.
Here's how I fared in round #1.
After breaking two needles, and having the machine toss a chunk of the second one at my lip, and not having another needle of the right size, I realized this wasn't going to work. At least not without a trip to the garment district for a lot more needles.
Someone with more of a clue would cut the towel instead of folding it. This was just a quick prototype. But at this point, I'm kind of at a loss about how to tie the bottom. The little bit of thinking leads me to think my first approach is a fail.
A better approach to hacking up thick towels is to just use stretch band and a couple of alligator clips. Make a loop of stretch band and then sew two short strips at the back. The idea is to fold the towel over the front of the loop, put the loop over your head, then attach the clips to a spot that pulls the bottom part of the towel snug against your neck.
At least it's a lot safer than dodging metal fragments.
Someone please tell me this is a huge waste of time on my part and I can just ______.
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