Oooh. Oily.

Shaving Test 1: Oil Mediums
(Step One, Legs)

I've now spent about two weeks shaving one leg with baby oil and the other with glycerin soap suds. Otherwise, I treated them exactly the same--same amount of exfoliation before and moisturizer after. I tell you, after growing up using suds, the idea felt very strange. But I immediately warmed to it.

Things I liked:

• Not having to rely on a shower puff to work up foam. It felt like less work, and less messy too.
• Being able to see exactly where I was shaving. (I wiped out last week on my roller skates and have a huge bruise and scab on one knee where the rink's hardwood removed some skin. Knowing precisely where to avoid that area would have been much appreciated... if I had been shaving that leg with oil. D'oh.)
• The sensation of being moisturized stayed with me after I got out of the shower--though I did apply lotion anyway.

Things I didn't like:

• It musses up the tub faster. And not only does the hair cling to that after the shower but it also hangs on for dear life to the razor and the blades. Rinsing, even with a high pressure shower head, only does so much.
• For some reason, though my skin felt more moisturized, it also stung a little more after the shower. Very odd.

I can't say that the shave is noticeably closer with oil than soap, or the opposite. Would I switch? It feels nice, but I sure don't like how quickly the razor clogs up. I've found I like shaving with the baby oil, and I'd be interested to see how an actual shaving oil, or canola oil as some have promoted, would be different. But the observations aren't a shocking improvement.

Next step? Trying it on my face. Everybody grimace with me.

I've tried it a couple of times already, and my initial thoughts are that a.) the razor doesn't want to glide as smoothly, and b.) my face feels a little less ravaged afterward. Interesting. The latter could be because it's a fresh razor. We'll see. Stay tuned.