| Written by Thingfish,
on 25-06-2007 05:09
|
 When the boffins at Netnewsasia stunned the world with our top-secret prototype for the world’s first 18 blade shave, we thought we were merely having a harmless pop at beard-bashing monopolist Gillette and its mission to stay one blade ahead of the rest.
But little did I know than that I was opening a whole new can of worms, dipping my toe into the brave new world of the male skincare experience.
A couple of days after posting my depilatory revelations, I got a message from Will King , the founder of upstart shaving foam vendor King of Shaves.
Now you have to respect anyone with the balls to compete with a monopoly, and that’s pretty much what the shaving industry’s become. So When Will promised to let me in on 'a big press announcement' in the next few days, that was a promise I could hardly ignore.
If I was reading the situation right, it sounded like the King of Shaves was about to announce a world shaving scoop – maybe even a King of Shaves razor that would take on the mighty Gillette. After all, surely a company with a name like King of Shaves must have a top secret holographic shaving lab somewhere?
So I replied to Will and a day later, got a copy of a note to one of his staff, telling her to send me what I assumed would be the press release and my hot new razor.
Edge of the seat time? Not exactly. the next week came and went and I didn't receive any amazing press release, so I promptly forgot all about it.
A mysterious package
Until a few weeks later, when I received a parcel from some company I'd never heard of named Knowledge and Merchandising Inc. Everyone loves to get a package in the post, particularly if it says Amazon, but it's all the more intriguing when you don't know the sender. Here in the Philippines, it's good to be a little weary of mysterious parcels, so I took the box, gave it a thorough security scan and carefully opened it up.
There within a kilo of polystyrene granules, I found more shaving products than I could have imagined in all my wildest dreams, each with hi-tech, futuristic names like Alphagel DDS Dual Delivery System and Micro Magnetically Enhanced Magnagel. Clearly with names like that, these were no ordinary shaving aids: These were the building blocks of Will King's Advanced Shaving Software system.
Not that I've ever dreamt about shaving products. It's not one of my chief preoccupations. Since I first picked up a Gillette GII to remove the adolescent bum-fluff from my top lip 30 years ago, I've regarded shaving as an inconvenient waste of quality time.
My normal morning routine is to fetch the coffee and stagger into the bathroom at around 11am, splash hot water on my face, apply foam and scrape it all off with whichever blade comes to hand. I'll do it once, do it quickly and forget about it. But that kind of attitude is clearly out of step with today's metrosex world, where every man is expected to shave his chest, gel his hair, wear a chronometer and scent his earlobes with eau de whore's drawers.
The best part of waking up, is in the making up
If the bottles and tubes in my surprise package mean anything, it can only be that modern man no longer starts his day with the traditional quick shit, shave and shower. Instead, he spends half the first half of his day getting ready for the second half. Wonder why new bathrooms always have two wash basins? Because modern couples need to spend the entire morning together making up their modern faces.
The instructions that came with one of the packs (yes, modern shaving requires a manual), advised; "don't shave first thing in the morning, let your skin wake up so shave after breakfast". Are these people serious? Maybe I should get my skin a coffee before offering one to my tongue? But no matter who wakes up first, if you start each day the King of Shaves way, you can say goodbye to breakfast.
Following the King of Shaves regimen, I'll start off my morning with a dose of Deep Cleansing ASC2 Face Scrub Active Skin Cleansing, followed by some Deep Cleansing ASC2 Face Wash. I'll prepare my beard with a splash of K-XF Pre Shave Facial Scrub and a few drops of Formula Alpha Shaving Oil, though I'll have to choose between the Supercooled Menthol and Natural Unmentholated flavours. I then have a more critical choice between the Magnagel MME (Micro Magnetically Enhanced), Alphagel DDS Dual Delivery System or Kinexium Silicon Technology Advanced Formula Shaving Gel – I’m undecided whether to use one after the other and shave three times a day, or use them on alternate days. Once I've crossed that bridge, I’ll finally get down to the actual shaving business (using the patented Netnewsasia Nuke9 with Vibranose), after which I’ll rub in a splurt of K-GL Post Shave Recovery Gel and some K-24|24 Active SDS3 Moisturiser.
So after a lifetime of 10-minute shaves, I'm suddenly expected to get up at the crack of dawn just to apply all my new gels, washes, oils and scrubs. Leisurely mornings will be a thing of the past; sacrificed on the altar of the perfect shave. And what’s most ironic about this whole thing is that until I opened that package, I was perfectly happy in my gel-free shaving ignorance, untroubled by my need for dual delivery systems and pre-shave facial scrubs.
This may seem like a trivial gauntlet to throw down, but I say it's time we stand up against this dermatological dictatorship of depilatory domination, and say 'no' to those who'd stake their claims on our morning ablutions. Today, it may just be our chins, but tomorrow who knows what sacrifices we'll be expected to endure - and I for one am not about to break down and accept a future of collagen lips and Brazilian bikini waxes.
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2007: A face odyssey. This could this be the frightening future faced by our chins in the mornings of tomorrow. Surely there's more to life than this?
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Last update : 25-06-2007 15:32
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i knew that king had something up, have you seen his latest posting with a video of branson's galactic spaceship on it - apparently it is being unveiled this week. keep me posted, how can we find out more?
i knew that king had something up, have you seen his latest posting with a video of branson's galactic spaceship on it - apparently it is being unveiled this week. keep me posted, how can we find out more?