Consider this

[LJRead]

What is the most highly developed instrument in use today?  My vote would go to the humble safety razor.  You see, I grew up during the hay day of development when, it seemed, weekly came a new variety.  So there was the old single sided blade with a back to it, the double sided blade, the single blade that you changed by inserting a probe like thing and pushing in a new blade, with the old one going out at the same time, there was, if I remember correctly, one in which the blades just were built in and sort of rotated into place, then we graduated to twin blade, twin blade with teflon strip, triple blade, and probably a lot of others.  My wife tells me there is a new razor for women which contains the shaving soap and a lotion built in. 

Each razor guarantees you will get the closest shave ever.

Well tonight I got to use the ultimate 'Gillette' brought back to me by my wife complete with five blades, plus a trimmer blade on the back.  You see, I ran out of my twenty five cent single bladed bics which are about all that can be purchased here and had to use this monstrosity.  It even came with a name - "Fusion" and probably an attitude.

Of course, with safety razors, the stakes are tremendous - everyone uses them and they are made to be disposable, so that everyone is continually buying more.

Well, after tearing my beautiful mug up with the new razor, I decided that, for one thing it is too damned heavy and cumbersome, I can't get replacement blades without a high cost, and I have been more than pleased with my cheapy bics. Ha!!!

Kind of like bikes, isn't it - they too get more complex, more cumbersome, heavier and more expensive - in a word, less fun to use.

Yep, back to my bic.

[1Blackwolf1]

  Totally agree with you on this summation.  Newer, faster, redesigned isn't always what it's cracked up to be.  I've noticed that a lot lately.

  Went back to point ignition on my bike after a fiasco and near disaster with electronic ignition recently.  I can agree with improvements in technology but I guess some things are better off the simpler they are designed.  I still like the old razor myself that had the drop in double edged blade..now that was a shave.  Will.

[The Garbone]

I use a cheap disposable triple blade,  but at least its not electric...



But I do have the mug and brush setup instead of cream from a can..

[PhilJ]

With my badger bristle brush and English soap, I plod along. For things to be really improved they would just last longer, not more blades.

[geoffbaker]

Garbone, great minds think alike and fools seldom differ.

I too use a triple but use a shaving brush and soap.

I was working on trying to cut down on the packaging I have to deal with and decided that soap in a cardboard box was a lot better for the environment than cans of pressurized goo.

It was a great improvement over foam, but I put that down to HOT WATER.

I now boil water, soak a washcloth and warm my ugly mug with it, then make soap and shave. Result is I reuse the blades nearly twenty times (as opposed to just twice at best before) and it feels GOOD.

On the other hand I use a triple thanks to the best marketing device ever... I was a double bladed fan (cheap BICS) and Gilette sent me a FREE triple to try about four years ago. And it really worked much better than my double bladed one...

BUT I'm not trying a four or five blade monstrosity... three is just fine.

Like most things, modern shaving is subject to massive over-engineering plus even more massive overmarketing.

Could be worse I suppose... look at the engineering and marketing that goes into women's soap and beauty cream... 'guaranteed to soften those lines'....

[luoma]

Proper design always beats bells and whistles. I like Blackwolf's comment about his ignition. Made me think of Rutan, the aircraft designer. He builds machines that are high-tech, while at the same time being simpler than existing designs. Rather than add complicated do dads, just redesign to remove the need for the do dad. I think that is why RE is still so successful after all these years. People make far more complex bikes that the Bullet, but are they really better at giving you what you want out of a bike? If they were, there would be no RE, there would be no new Triumph Bonnie, there would be no Ural.

By the way, I still use a safety razor too. Electrics don't do the job. By their very design, they can't give me a close shave.

[Vince]

     I learned to shave in the shower. At the end my face is already warm and wet so I lather up with regular bar soap. It goes fast, blades last almost forever and I hardly ever nick myself. The only down side is that sometimes the sideburns are not ......even.  Maybe if I got one of those no fog shower mirrors.

[LJRead]

Not having warm water lets me out of saving blades.  I haven't had a hot shower in ten years (when I was last in New Zealand) and five before that.  In summer months a hot shower isn't needed but it is mid winter now (low as maybe 60 F) and I do get a wake up call each time I dump a bowl of water over my head.  No pressurized water either.  Just a bowl and a bucket.  If I shave at the end of a wash off then my beard softens so I suppose that is the same thing as hot water.

Well, I see the shaver above has a pivot head (follows the face contours) and vitamin E and aloa.  I suppose some comparisons could easily be made with other things like cars and bikes, but even there we get back to the simple bic, or VW or R E.  I worked on my bike yesterday, torquing the head and cleaning the carb - so simple with only one of each to worry about.  Of course then bikes went up in cylinders, smoothness and complexity.  How much of all this has to do with sales and marketability and how much has to do with providing a good, functional bike?

The real problem isn't with shavers or bikes or cars, it is the mucking around designers are doing with everything that touches our lives.  Give me a saddled horse, a Winchester rifle, a Russian Colt .44, a lariat and a bed sheet, bag of beans and of flour, some coffee and I can go far - as far as the next barbed wire fence (yes, I've been reading some Westerns lately!).  My father and grandfathers used the old straightedge, a leather strop and a mug of soap and a brush.  If I tried it my face would look like mince meat!

[The Garbone]

Shower bag=======>   Linky 

[PhilJ]

There ya go Larry, Garbone's got you covered. It will bring you back into the 21st century.

Hey Vince, I always thought women shaved in showers. 

[LJRead]

Sorry but a shower bag doesn't fit the bill.  It is only when you begin to actually smell like your horse that true bonding can take place, and you need the bonding to get you over the next barbed wire fence!

I very well know this because I read it in a book!

[PhilJ]

Really getting into those Westerns aren't you. I've read a few over the years but haven't in a long time. It might be time to renew that effort .... if your going to keep referencing them. 

[geoffbaker]

If you're starting to smell like your horse, LJ, I may have to review my plans to visit Tonga!

But I don't actually believe it - I think MrsLJ would be turning the garden hose on you right now....

[Vince]

There ya go Larry, Garbone's got you covered. It will bring you back into the 21st century.

Hey Vince, I always thought women shaved in showers. 

     Does this mean I should schedule that operation?

[Cabo Cruz]

"Does this mean I should schedule that operation?"  Vince

Absolutely not, Br. Vince!!!  These guys apparently could not figure out that you shower with women, man!!!  WOWZAA!!!