men: never wax your beard

My facial hair is kind of weird. I don't grow a full beard. I have a moustache and a chin-beard. Basically, I can do a Van Dyke and that's about it. This has always made me a little sad, because my father had a full beard and I always wondered how I'd look with one. (I am, in general, in favor of beards; in college I spent maybe two quarters trying to convince my friend Keith that he needed to grow a beard, because he would look awesome with one. He was reluctant, but finally tried it, and he looked terrific -- the guy went from babyface to Serious Man^TM.) It grows really slowly, and it doesn't trim that well. So the good news is I don't have to shave much. Still, I am lazy and hate the bother of shaving.

So today I was getting a haircut, and I looked over and saw that they did facial waxing, and wondered, "Hmmm. What if --"

I DID NOT DO IT. They were booked up, and I had other stuff to do, but the idea was interesting. So I came home and looked up "male beard wax," and what I found was horrifying and hysterical. Jackiemc, at salongeek's forum, relayed her experience:

DO NOT TRY TO WAX A MAN'S BEARD!!!!

Trust me on this, I 'experimented' on Sean a little while ago to find out just how strong the Perron Rigot male wax was, I applied a very small patch of wax to his chin (about 1" x 1.5") and he almost hit the ceiling when I ripped it away!!! I only got half of it away on the first go and he had tears in his eyes when I told him there was still another half to come off - And the BLOOD!!!! It was really scarey!! It was everywhere! I hadn't damaged his skin, it was just the roots were so damn big! I near enough had to sit on his chest to get him to let me remove the other half of the wax. But when I did, and after I managed to get the blood to stop flowing, I looked at what was in the wax and it was SO strange! Like nothing I'd ever seen on my waxing course!!!

I'm not sure who was more stupid, me for asking if he'd let me try it out on him or him for saying yes!