July 3, 2023

• Prep: Shower
• Brush: Zenith 507U XSE #TEXASPIGSTINKMASSACRE #OLDWORLD
• Razor: Chiseled Face Legacy #CNC
• Blade: Gillette Platinum
• Lather: Moon Soaps - Amaretto
• Post Shave: Moon Soaps - Amaretto Balm
• Fragrance: None

I was on the fence today about which soap to go with today, as I have both MS Amaretto and Cella. Ultimately I went with the Amaretto as I have the matching balm. It was an impulse purchase some months ago, I opened up the tub, and knew it was fate. It smells absolutely amazing, to the point you want to take a spoon to it and eat it. I usually use a measuring spoon for a bowl lather, but for this soap specifically, I have to use double the amount I would normally use. Keeping it Italian themed, the lather will be whipped up with an Italian brush recommended by /u/J33pGuy13

To honor /u/RedMosquitoMM victory, I will be using a CF Legacy for the first time; the same used in this SOTD just days ago.

There is nothing wrong with the almonds in the photo. They are coconut almonds from Trader Joes, and they are also incredible.

#ROTY

LGSOTD 03-July

• Brush: Chisel & Hound - 'Finned' V14 #COMPOSITE #SHD
• Razor: GEM - Junior  #BRASSING #TWINS
• Blade: Personna - GEM PTFE 
• Lather: Cella – Extra Extra Purissima   
• Post Shave: Thayers – Lemon Astringent

Well, that was deeply unpleasant, I cannot stand marzipan in any form and if the scent is present in any form I cannot smell anything else. To voluntarily slap this on my face took a bit of resolve, but seeing as it’s my first effort this year I couldn’t skip one in the first few days.  I will say I cannot argue with the performance it was perfectly acceptable, but it will not see the light of day again beyond a PIF box. 

However the shave was made better by both the GEM Junior (tomorrow being the ER 1912 to make up the twins, or I think so anyway) and one of my favourite C&H brushes. Picked this up directly over a year ago in another heart racing, fastest finger drop and it quickly became one of my favourites. I'm still a big fan of my first Casanova V11 but this one is right up there. I've sworn off (on more than one occasion) picking more up with knots installed…but tell that to my additional purchases that go right through to V18 and I've not regretted one of them, I swear it's an addiction! 

The daily challenge being to honour the former king and reigning champ /u/RedMosquitoMM, no offence, all in jest (being new to the games and only recently starting to become active I'm still getting to know the crowd). However re-reading some of his prior games post and posts in general I can see valued contributions along with some amusing comments. I particularly enjoyed the likes of non-spooky summer solstice and he also seems to really understand scents, I most definitely do not…think caveman - "Good" or "Bad", I can see why he was declared the winner, well played. 

Hope everyone has a good kick off to the week. 

Cheers

Marc

ROTY

PhotoContest

Mon Jul 03 2023

• Prep: Soap and warm water
• Razor: Merker 34C HD
• Blade: Feather HI Stainless
• Brush: AP Shave Co 26 mm 2Bed Knot in the Zen Handle
• Lather: Cella Milano - Crema Da Barba Almond Soap
• Post Shave: Truefitt and Hill - Freshman A/S

Welcome to day 3 of the later games. Cella is quite possibly one of my least favorites but it does later up nice and shave nice.

All hail to /u/RedMosquitoMM, it is safe to say I do not have his commitment to shaving.

ROTY

7/3/23

• Brush: Muninn Woodworks Purple Valley w/ 24mm Lotus Manchuria #COMPOSITE
• Razor: Ralf Aust 6/8, Full Hollow Square Point #ALLNATURAL #STR8SNOB
• Lather: Boellis Panama 1924 - Notes: Almond
• Post Shave: Spearhead Shaving - Seaforth! Black Watch Aftershave Splash

To pay tribute to u/RedMosquitoMM today, I went through and added to a playlist 3 songs from the last 3 months of posts on the 3rd and listened to those during my shave. That list being:

Roadside Graves - No One Will Know Where You've Been

Tyler Childers - Can I Take My Hounds to Heaven?

Warren Zevon - Werewolves of London (Only the artist was listed, so I picked this one).

🍻 u/RedMosquitoMM

This smush of Boellis comes courtesy of u/J33pGuy13. Almond scents are not really something I go for. I mean, the scent isn't gross to me or anything, I just find it pretty meh. This was my first time with Boellis, and, like the scent, I also found performance to be pretty meh. Primary slickness was fine, residual there wasn't much of. My post shave feel with it wasn't bad by any means. Reading that almond is a typical Italian barbershop scent, I opted to stray away from the genre. The first thing that comes to mind when I think "almond" is HoM - Almond Leather. I reached for something with leather. Black Watch is so much more than leather. Spicy, incense-y and with a hint of citrus and leather. It was quick to drown out the almond, but I liked the concept of the two together.

This Ralf Aust is 🐐 in my den. I've said it before, and I'll keep saying it. The shorter blade with the thumb notch, the scalloped spine, and middle ground 6/8 size make this razor a comfortable tool for hair removal (and it's so pretty 😍). Overall, it was a nice shave this morning.

#ROTY

July 3, 2023

https://imgur.com/gallery/IktaikV

Prep: None

Brush: Vikings Blade White Knight Synthetic #COMPOSITE #FAUXFUR

Razor: Rockwell 6s R6 Plate

Blade: Treet Platinum (3)

Lather: Cella Red soap

Post Shave: Cella red aftershave

Travel shave today, so nothing too fancy. I'm a much bigger fan of this almond scent over Arkos. Always a DFS with Cella.

Challenge: In honor of u/RedMosquitoMM and their avatar I opted to shave while wearing sunglasses today.

#ROTY

• Brush: Omega 63171 #WEDONTNEEDNOSTINKINGBADGERS

• Razor: Henson AL-13 #RAINBOW #CNC

• Blade: Bic Chrome Platinum

• Lather: Stirling Soap Co. - Almond Creme

• Post Shave: House of Mammoth - Almond Leather

• Fragrance: Chatillon Lux - Gratiot League Square

Today's Theme: Almonday - ~~all 3 of my~~ my lather and post shave scents contain almond notes to varying degrees. (see update below)

Today's Challenge: 2022 LG Winner Appreciation Day - You'll have to check my SOTD photo and decide for yourself

My theme for today's shave: Sweetness #photocontest

So although I've done the Almond Creme/Almond Leather combo before, today I thought about sweetness both in fragrance and in my personal life. Almond is traditionally a sweet scent that everyone always compares to cherries or marzipan, and Stirling's Almond Creme is pretty much exactly that. Sweetness overload with very cherry forward. Almond Leather is a great complement to Almond Creme because of how the leather dries down and mellows out the sweetness without clashing against it. What I did not expect was that upon applying the Gratiot League Square frag I smelled like Cherry Coke. Very unexpected but not altogether unlikeable. This will require further testing after lather games.

For hardware, I borrowed my fiancee's Henson for the rainbow hashtag since it's a colored razor and also kind of matched the almond color theme. Super autopilot razor that kind of feels like I'm using a cartridge razor. Can definitely see this being counterproductive to good technique but it's a really easy razor to use. The omega brush is a cheapo badger and the first badger brush that I ever got. Honestly aside from the scritchiness of the hairs, it's a perfectly serviceable brush, especially for 1-pass shaves.

For music today, I continued with the theme of sweetness and picked out my old Backstreet Boys CD. Pretty much all the songs are love songs or love-adjacent, but it's honestly one of the more classic boy band albums of the era and I'm glad I still have it after all these years. All I Have to Give sounded like the sweetest love song when I was younger, now I listen to the lyrics and think "yep this is the anthem of broke sad bois" #FOF #ROTY

Update: I just reread the scent notes on GLS and looks like Almond is nowhere to be found. I'm still not sure why it smells like Cherry Coke to me and I'm even more confused now.

July 3, 2023 – RedmosquitoMM day  

• Brush: Chisel & Hound Badger  #SHD #composite
• Razor: Gillette Superspeed  
• Blade: Gillette Nacet (1)  
• Lather: Cella – Red  
• Post Shave: Zingari Man – Traditionalist  

• Fragrance: Maher Olfactive – Crystal Moon  

• Coffee: Switch Coffee Collective Columbia

• Music:. sweet silence followed by my son singing “you are my sunshine.”

Today we celebrate last year’s winner u/redmosquitoMM. I looked over his posts and I’m pretty sure the judges would prefer I not copy his verbosity from last year. So we’ll leave this to a few points, first including the coffee and music, which he does in his SOTD posts and second, making my #photocontest an outside affair (scenery) the home of mosquitoes. But also since this is a competition (but a friendly one) including something to keep away our winner from last year. I also used cella red, but that was totally coincidence so I’m not counting it.

On the #fof side, my calendar notes just said “traditional” which made sense for cella (a traditional soap and scent) and “the traditionalist” in name. But I couldn’t remember why I chose crystal moon. So I went back and read Shawn’s blog about it and saw the bit about the legend of the princess in a crystal castle. And it came back to me. I was thinking of all the various traditional story tropes that seem to crop up in every culture. There’s a lot of that when you look at it. Humans love traditions and we create them like crazy. Sometimes we borrow directly from each other (as Shawn did with elements of this fragrance) sometimes we independently arrive at the same things (as with many of the tropes.) Still fascinating to me. Here at the sub we have a tradition that turns a decade next year and while I’m just a rookie (going for #ROTY) I’m glad to be a part of it.

Also found out I DQ’d myself yesterday by triggering the spam filter and effing up my formating causing the lather to drop off, which probably chucks me from several places and might throw me out of ROTY (that's up to u/j33pguy13) On the flip side frees me up to use use stuff I had set aside to maximize points. :shreds calendar he spent 3 weeks making: let’s go.

• Brush: Simpson Classic #1 synthetic brush #SMOLL

• Razor: Karve shaving - Christopher Bradley

• Lather: Captain's Choice - Italia soap

• Post Shave: Noble Otter - Unscented Splash

• Fragrance: Catie's Bubbles - Blugere

ROTY

Just a quick single pass shave today. Also my first time using a soap from Captain's Choice. The name Italia made me feel it was a perfect representation of almond a Classic Italian shaving soap scent. The soap was extremely soft and I rather liked the subtle sweet smell of almond while I shaved. Doesn't have much staying power though.

I thought the perfect almond aftershave was one that wouldn't get in the way of the almond soap so I went unscented. Respect the almond.

And to honor the Great u/RedMosquitoMM for his previous victory in the trials and tribulations of the lather games 2022, I offer this poem of sorts because I read alot of Dr. Seuss to my kiddo and because the bards they sing of it.

The great Red Mosquito ate bedtime Dorito's much to his partners dismay

The crumbs in the bed made them stick to his head and they entered his back hairs to stay

He gets up each day in a particular way, a stout and devoted wet shaver

He tells all he knows to his internet shave bros and engages in questionable online behavior.

So cheers to a guy a champion of shavers I wish you all the booze and sexual partners of all flavors

And may you live long and avoid trouble for misbehaving as you sling youre big ol dong across the pages of r/wetshaving

JULY 3, 2023

• Brush: Stirling 24mm Synthetic
• Razor: Gillette King C. Chrome
• Lather: Captain’s Choice - 45 Parallel
• Post Shave: Zingari Man - Navigator
• Fragrance. Zingari Man - Navigator

First and foremost let me point out how much music I have discovered from u/redmosquitoMM daily SOTDs throughout the last few months. I keep googling all the music he posts and adding to my playlist so thank you sir!

Today I chose captain’s choice because ALMONDS is all I smell!!! It’s crazy how much is in there (I think). I can’t smell anything else. It paired somewhat nicely with the navigator splash but that was the closest splash I own that came remotely close to it. I read today that ITALIA also has a lot of almonds so next thing on my wish list. My LG run continues.

ROTY

July 3, 2023 – Almonday * Brush: Paladin Chief 26mm Satin Juma Smoke
Razor: Blackland Blackbird Ti
Blade: Personna Lab Blue (?)
Lather: Captain’s Choice - Italia
Post Shave: House of Mammoth – Smash Splash * Coffee: Kirkland Signature – Summit Roast * Music: Led Zepplin – Stairway to Heaven It was nice to get back to my usual shave hardware today and be in familiar territory for a more straightforward shave.

The Lather: Honestly, I’m not a big fan of the Captain’s Choice base. The base is chunky out of the sample and the texture is off-putting right out the gate. It lathers up relatively easy, but I find it neither exceptionally slick nor well cushioning. It’s good enough for a decent shave, but why settle.

Scent (Theme): You can’t help but be smacked in the face with the scent of almonds when shaving with Italia. It is, in fact, the only scent note listed on the Captains Choice site. I happen to actually like the scent of almonds and my kids love this scent.

After Shave (Theme): So I took some time to think about what aftershave to pair with the almond scent as I don’t have a strictly almond option. For me, I only really eat almonds while having a cocktail. So Smash seemed like a perfect fit. It has the boozy properties that just make me feel like I’m lounging with a drink and snack.

Challenge: This was perhaps the trickiest part of the day for me as I know very little about u/RedMosquitoMM. I delved into the last 3 months of his SOTD’s and came up with a 3 prong approach to an appropriate way to honor him, a trifecta of honor if you will. * Coffee: Now I don’t drink coffee, but in every SOTD RedMosquitoMM posts his daily coffee. So I fired up whatever my wife had and did my best to make it enjoyable. I faired ok and was wide awake for the shave. * Music: This was an easy one. It takes me a fair amount of time to shave so I picked the longest song I knew. Stairway to Heaven carried me through the shave and it’s an awesome song to boot. * Blade: Looking at his posts I was in awe of the number of uses he gets from a blade. I think my personal best is around 5, but he’s putting in up to 50 uses. So I dug through my used blade pile and found myself a random, old, used Personna Lab Blue so I could get the full RedMosquitoMM experience.

#ROTY

• Brush: Van Der Hagen Boar Brush

• Razor: Van Der Hagen 85mm Safety Razor

• Blade: Shark Super Chrome

• Lather: Captain's Choice Italia

ROTY

Day 3 - Almonday

• Brush: Maggard Razors Black Resin Handle Synthetic Shaving Brush, 24mm
• Razor: Karve CB #CNC
• Blade: Astra Green
• Lather: Stirling - Almond Creme
• Post Shave: Stirling - Almond Creme
• Fragrance: Chatillon Lux - 1904

To honor /u/RedMosquitoMM, I took a moment during my shave to think about the effort and time this event takes. I never thought I would need Excel to help or plan my shaves. My short post takes me longer than I would like to admit, and my posts have a fraction of his write-ups, so hats off to him. I then took a few extra moments to think about the effort and time the coordinators provided. I appreciate y'all.

It was such a relief to use a blade for shaving! And hoping u/VisceralWatch doesn't catch any issues.

For the fragrance- I was thinking about how to play with the sweet almond scent from the Stirling. I decided to go with 1904. 1904 has such a nice strong coffee and cardamon note. My thought was to turn the coffee shop into a bakery with the sweet almond. It kind of worked, but the almond faded quickly.

ROTY #FOF

July 3, 2023

• Brush: AP Shave Co. 26mm G5C
• Razor: Feather Artist Club SS Folding
• Blade: Kai ProTouch MG
• Lather: House of Mammoth – Almond Leather
• Post Shave: Zingari – Unscented

I think this is the last scent in my LG calendar that I’m really not a huge fan of. I think it’s good, it’s just very not for me. That said, since I don’t have any almond post-shave, I’m going with this unscented balm to make myself wallow in the Almond scent as long as possible.

To appreciate /u/RedMosquitoMM I’m using this folding Feather AC razor. I purchased this from him on the bazaar a couple months ago for my very first purchase from somebody in the community. I’m so grateful he was willing to entertain an online purchase from a person with zero history, while also being patient with my complete lack of PayPal understanding.

Healthy activity of the day: I’m forcing myself to get out of the house today. Going to see the movie Past Lives after my bike ride tonight. Mileage so far this LG: 6 miles.

Tags: #ROTY

** Lather Games Day 3** 

• Prep: Splash of warm water
• Brush: Van Der Hagen Boar Brush
• Razor: Van Der Hagen 85MM Safety Razor
• Blade: Bolzano Superinox
• Lather: Captain's Choice - Italia
• Post Shave: Noble Otter - Monarch balm

I love amaretto so the sweet almond coming off this Captain's Choice Italia was just what I was looking for. Like lathering up some Disaronno.

ROTY

July 3, 2023

Brush: Omega s-brush

Razor: Gillette Slim

Blade: Astra SP (Green)

Lather: Cella

All almonds were harmed in the making of this photo.

Tags: #ROTY #photocontest vegetables

July 3, 2023 Almonday

• Brush: Zenith r/Wetshaving Exclusive 31mm Moar Boar #CHONK #OLDWORLD
• Razor: Leaf Elite
• Blade: Wizamet (1)
• Lather: Cella – Milano Crema Da Barba
• Post Shave: Captain's Choice - Italia
• Fragrance: Maher Olfactive - Treachery

I don't end up using Cella very often, due to the sheer number of choices these days. It does however, provide a very good shave. Since Cella's aftershave does not smell like the soap, I opted to use Captain's Choice Italia, which is a dead ringer for the smell of Cella. As far as the fragrance goes, I can't say that my very undeveloped nose detects the almond in it, but it is definitely gourmand and smells delicious.

A Haiku dedicated to our own u/RedMosquitoMM

Shiny summertime

when RedMosquitoMM shaves

under the razor

#ROTY

July. 3, 2023 - SOTD 

• Prep: Splash of warm water
• Brush: Oumo O4 Venus SHD Badger Brush 26MM
• Razor: West Coast Shaving Multi Titanium Collection Razor
• Blade: King C Gillette
• Lather: Taylor of Old Bond Street - Almond Shave Cream
• Post Shave: Chiesled Face - Natural Artisan Aftershave Balm

ROTY

July 3, 2023 – I Can’t Escape Italia

• Brush: Chisel and Hound “Acer Pearl” w/ V20 Fanchurian #composite

• Razor: Schick Injector Type I1 #illfuckindoitagain

• Blade: Personna Injector (2)

• Lather: Cella – Milano Crema Da Barba

• Post Shave: Chicago Grooming Co. (Formerly Oleo Soapworks) – Shiloh

I often get mistaken as an Italian American. I am not. I am a mutt mish mash of 18th century American Anglos and 20th century Eastern European immigrants. Yet, people repeatedly casually assume that I am a Philadelphia Paesan. My online personna may not show it, but i am loud, boisterous, personable, and a bit brash, all common social traits of my home city brethren. Maybe that’s also why my first international trip as an adult of 39 last year was to Italy. I could have just bought this Cella from any of our preffered retailers, but why not go get it from the source and smuggle it back home. At first I wasnt impressed but this soap has grown on me. It’s no nonsense for me and for whatever reason, this new badger of mine loves it. Great clean 2.5 pass shave finished off with an Italian inspired splash, Chicago Grooming ADP-colonia dupe, shiloh.

For the u/RedMosquitoMM challenge, I had to to look back through his post and how to honor as I havent had many if any interactions with him. Seems like he’s a bit of a connoisseur of the bespoke brushed, so I decided to use my new badger from Chisel and Hound. Maybe it’s breaking in more, maybe its me, or maybe just the soap, but this brush and cella loved each other. Also in honor of his win last year, I’ll try a little extra tonight and go for a couple scavenger points.

Night night shave homies. Shaka emoji.

ROTY

July 3, 2023 – Month of Lather Day 3

• Brush: DS Cosmetics Queen Red handle w/ DSC 24mm SHD G7 Synthetic knot
• Razor: Razorock Game Changer .68-P
• Blade: Gillette Platinum (1)
• Preshave: Proraso – Eucalyptus Oil and Menthol Cream
• Lather: Cella Milano – Crema Da Barba Almond
• Post Shave: Stirling Soap Co. – Unscented Balm
• Fragrance: Polo - Red
• Music: Tina Turner - The Best

Daily Theme: If you looked in dictionary under almondy you'd find a picture of Cella Crema da Barba Almond. The fact that the container is red is an added bonus.

Daily Challenge: I can't rap like u/Crisp_Mango, I'm not creative enough to write an ode like u/MrTangerinesky, and I don't have easy access to the precision tools used by u/Rdthedo and u/hairykopite to create a crimson homage. What I can do is dedicate today's musical selection to /u/RedMosquitoMM. The song's title says it better than anything I could come up with.

An easygoing comfortable shave to start the day. Cella and the hardware did their jobs well and I was focused enough to keep my technique sound. A 2-pass DFS was the result.

A final nod to /u/RedMosquitoMM - while brainstorming today's challenge I found one of his comments (to fellow LG rook u/tsrblke) regarding Precision Loading. I'm a PL convert (thanks to u/CosmoBarber and his video) but I never quite figured out the transition from bowl to face lathering. With one phrase ("...and then add the last few dips of water while working the lather into my stubble...") I achieved lathering enlightenment thanks to /u/RedMosquitoMM. #ROTY

Jul. 3, 2023
Brush: Omega Synthetic
Razor: Karve CB
Blade: Personna Lab Blue
Lather: Cella - Red - Soap
Post Shave:* Cella - Red - Balm

Lather games day 3! Cella red for Almonday. Had to go back to my daily driver after yesterday shave. Was much more pleasant.

As for u/RedMosquitoMM I don’t know you and and relatively new to this sub. But I cracked this modelo and gave you an air cheers after my shave. so salud my guy!

ROTY