BS: Beard growth and weather?

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: Ebbie
Date: 13 Jul 10 - 06:19 PM

Only if you soak it in, Kevin. Think grass. :)

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 13 Jul 10 - 05:29 PM

Does washing make any difference to the rate hair grows?

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: MikeL2
Date: 13 Jul 10 - 07:16 AM

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: bubblyrat - PM
Date: 12 Jul 10 - 10:11 AM

" I remember a RAF guy with a "full set" being at RAF Brize Norton in 1975 or thereabouts ; I often used to see him in "The Beehive" ---was that you, MikeL2 ?? "

Hi bubbly

No that was not me. I was before that !! I have been to Brize Norton but as a civvy.

Since I was in the RAF I believe the rules regarding beards has changed.
They allow them for people with religeous or cultural beliefs.

Cheers

MikeL2

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: Will Fly
Date: 12 Jul 10 - 12:59 PM

Hot weather, cold weather, indifferent weather - the beard stays on now - for good. A "no. 6" trim every three weeks keeps it neat.

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: bubblyrat
Date: 12 Jul 10 - 10:13 AM

Ps This here hot weather doesn't seem to affect my "set" ,to be honest, although the hair on my head does seem to grow more quickly !

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: bubblyrat
Date: 12 Jul 10 - 10:11 AM

I remember a RAF guy with a "full set" being at RAF Brize Norton in 1975 or thereabouts ; I often used to see him in "The Beehive" ---was that you, MikeL2 ??

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: LilyFestre
Date: 11 Jul 10 - 07:51 PM

Having finished with chemotherapy 3 weeks ago, I have noticed that the hair on my head has grown in quite a bit in the last 2 weeks when the weather has been so hot and humid. I wondered if there was a connection too. I mean, I know my hair will grow back since the chemo has ended but it seems to have grown MORE in the last week than the others. It's kinda like our corn which has sprouted up in a big way this past week with the hot & humid weather....so much so that my husband has taken to calling me Sprout! :)

Michelle

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 11 Jul 10 - 02:48 PM

MikeL2 -

I seriously doubt that you're older than my daddy's (professional) barber clippers. I still remember the objections mom made when he "blew" $39 for them ca. 1947, when he got "phased out" at the aircraft plant and went back - temporarily - to barbering.

They cut just like the best of the new ones. I don't use them just 'cause there's sort of a sentimental respect for his tools.

But a good (experienced) barber, with an evil sense of humor, can make a lot of "innocent" things hurt like $@%!$@!. An excellent example is the "brisk shampoo" on a fair-haired victim, followed by generous application of an alcohol "hair tonic." That gives just enough "burn" to get a complaint, allowing the opportunity to apply a very warm water rinse that - as mentioned above - BURNS LIKE HELL!.

Even Manual Hair Clippers can give a painless close cut if used properly, but poor (even if intentionally poor) technique can simulate ripping the hair off with blacksmith tongs.

(Every good barber should still have a manual clipper, for customers using oxygen, although probably few do.)

John

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: MikeL2
Date: 11 Jul 10 - 02:25 PM

hi john

I had the beard removed by the Airforce "barber". These were old clippers that I swear had never been cleaned or sharpened.

What he left was not easily shaved off by my normal razor.....ouch !!

I concede that perhaps with today's new technology devices it might not be too bad.....but I am not going to chance it....lol

So it is sans beard for me.

cheers

MikeL2

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 11 Jul 10 - 12:02 PM

Removal of a beard would, for most people, be the best excuse for visiting a barber rather than trying to take care of it yourself.

Shaving "long hairs" can be painful, tedious, and messy. But a decent hair clipper (electric or even the old mechanical squeeze-n-rip) can cut it painlessly back to where just about any razor can handle it without trauma.

I general do shave "under the chin," due to some slight tenderness there; but since I don't go out often it's occasionally several days between "full cleanups." If it's been more than about 4 days, the clippers come first, then the shower and shave.

The problem is that I can't remember whether the clippers I'm using were from the "home barber kit" or are the ones I got in the "pet trimming kit" back when I had a poodle that required maintenance.

The clippers in both were essentially identical, but I had to do a little "tweaking" to take some rough edges off and square up the blades on the pet set. (Both clippers are about 30 years old.)

John

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: MikeL2
Date: 11 Jul 10 - 11:24 AM

hi all

many years ago when I was in the Airforce I contacted on my face.

I was treated at the local hospital with antibiotic face cream. I was told not to shave until cleared by the hospital to do so.

This lasted for a few weeks by which time I had a full set.

At that time the RAF had a rule that airmen had to be clean-shaven ( you were allowed a moustache !!) and when the treatment was up I had to remove the beard. The trouble and pain I had has made me ever since be careful not to go through that again.

So it clean shaven for me.....folk music or not......lol

Cheers

MikeL2

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: gnu
Date: 11 Jul 10 - 09:15 AM

I used to have a beard but why deny the people such a handsome face? Besides, the scars look cool man.

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: Leadfingers
Date: 11 Jul 10 - 08:03 AM

In eighteen months or so my beard will be Forty ! The HELL with shaving every day !!

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 11 Jul 10 - 06:03 AM

gnu -

After the first of my carotid Roto Rooter^® excavations, it took almost two years before I could shave below the chin without quite a bit of tenderness, but not being able to feel where the razor was doin' it's thing was probably more annoying than the minor pain.

After the lecture I gave the doc about the first one, he neglected to cut any significant nerves when he did the other side, so it was a bit less trouble.

I tried the lectro shaver when I was younger, but my whiskers were too much for the early 60s models, and just ripped the blades out of the machines, so I went back to my Bresduk and the cup soap.

About 30 or 40 years ago I found that the best shave I could get was just by crawlin' in a warm shower and scrapin' while it's wet. No lotions, suds, or anything else needed.

Friends who learned of my method complained that the mirror steamed up when they tried it, but my contention was that I'd seen enough of my ugly face by the time I was 30 that I didn't really need to look at it to know where the important parts are. It could be time to take a look and see if I've lopped off anything significant; but I'm sort of expect someone would tell me if there are missing parts.

When and how and why you do it are really rather personal things to more men than will admit to not liking discussion of their personal how-to. Can't blame you for not wanting to do the testing for us all.

But then we normal guys don't need much explainin' as long as it gets done when we feel like it.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: gnu
Date: 10 Jul 10 - 07:02 PM

Doug C.... after a partial parotidectomy on the right (cell phone tumour) and a full on the left (parotid stone... er, STONE!... BIG mother stone!), I am a Phillips electric shaver man.

JIK.... okay, I suppose I could wash up once in a while to see if it makes a difference.

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: Les from Hull
Date: 10 Jul 10 - 06:12 PM

Shaving? Ha!

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 10 Jul 10 - 05:59 PM

gnu -

Dang it, I was hoping you'd take the challenge and do the experiment, so that you'd be able to give us an authoritative report that it's all caused by leaving the window blind open when the moon is full!

My first response probably should have asked whether you really consider your ears part of your face, and whether you're shaving your forehead.

And some good study of what makes finger nails grow wouldn't hurt with all the pickers here. I'm not aware of any pickers for whom toenail growth would be too interesting (for picking), but corollary effects sometimes lead to great discoveries.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 10 Jul 10 - 05:06 PM

Try changing the blade once a while. They don't last forever.
;-)


DC

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: gnu
Date: 10 Jul 10 - 04:58 PM

John... you are always the fountain of knowledge, and thanks, but, sometimes, you just take the mystery and fun out of it. I don't need a more complicated life. Next time, I'll just wait until morning.

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 10 Jul 10 - 04:53 PM

It is possible that there's an effect on beard growth from changes in temperature; but most "authoritative" opinions are just authoritative opinions in the mind of the "authority."

The more likely explanation for a need to shave more in hot weather, for most, is that when you perspire more the skin where the hair grows gets more sensitive, so you feel like the hair is longer, sooner.

If you look in the mirror and see more hair sooner after a shave, the cause more likely is that because of perspiration and the "other oilies" the perspiration brings to the skin surface of your hot skin, the previous shave just wasn't as close as you normally get, with your shaving method, when your face (or whatever you're shaving) is cooler.

In hot weather, you may get a closer first shave if you wash (soap and water or shampoo) first, then rinse with an alcohol splash. Ordinary rubbing alcohol works as well as fancy stuff for this step.

If the alcohol "burns," rinsing with cool or cold water will stop the burn instantly. (Rinsing with warm or hot water will make it burn more.) If there's a burn from the alcohol, it means that you haven't cleaned all the little cracks and holes in the skin, and by extension that you haven't gotten all the oil off the hair, so repeat the alcohol rinse until rinsing with warm water doesn't burn, so that you know that all the oilies have been removed. Repeating the alcohol rinse a couple of times is usually sufficient.

(The repeats are why using cheap propanol - rubbing alcohol - is better than using "shaving products." It's cheap.)

Once the skin and hair are "confirmed clean" you can be reasonably sure of getting a consistently clean "first shave" so that you'll be better able to tell if the beard (or whatever) actually is growing faster.

There may actually be a change in growth rate, but there also may be a need to "change your shaving habit" when the weather changes.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: Ross Campbell
Date: 09 Jul 10 - 10:05 PM

I find my beard growth, weather or not.
I used to leave fingernails longer on the right hand for fingerpicking guitar purposes, but now find I have to keep them short for concertina-playing - to avoid clicky percussion effects.

Ross

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: Ross Campbell
Date: 09 Jul 10 - 09:58 PM

Which month would that be, gnu?

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: gnu
Date: 09 Jul 10 - 01:04 PM

I noticed that about the fingernails as well! I guess there might be a connection.

I'll check my toenails at the end of the month when I change my socks.

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: MikeL2
Date: 09 Jul 10 - 11:49 AM

hi gnu

Yes I find beard growth increases in the warmer weather too.

And in my case nail growth.

Unfortunately it doesn't work on my head, but then again I don't shave there...lol

Cheers

MikeL2

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: David C. Carter
Date: 09 Jul 10 - 11:48 AM

I heard that "sex" makes the beard grow faster.

Don't know what it does to women though!

David

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 09 Jul 10 - 11:30 AM

OWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: frogprince
Date: 09 Jul 10 - 11:30 AM

Maybe it's the same reason I have to get frequent haircuts; things just seem to grow fast on piles of crap.
It has seemed to me sometimes that my rate of beard growth varies markedly, but I've never stopped and tried to figure out the variables.

Subject: RE: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 09 Jul 10 - 11:28 AM

Lycanthropy.

Subject: BS: Beard growth and weather?
From: gnu
Date: 09 Jul 10 - 11:22 AM

Never had to shave twice in one day unless I had a reason to look sharp in the evening or in the night. >;-).

I shaved twice a day two days this week in hot, humid weather. Today, I shaved at 6AM. I just scratched an itch on my face and figured I missed a spot. When I went to "touch up" I found I had to shave entirely again... 6 hours?

Anyone else? Is it the weather?