Facial Hair, changing

Awesome topic! I love beards. Beards are cool.

My beard grows really fast. If I clean shave early in the morning, I have a pretty thick stubble when I go to sleep (nearly Homer-style). I also have very sensitive skin (especially on my face, arms, and upper torso) that reacts badly to all but the wimpiest of soaps. This together made me give up on (clean) shaving in my early 20s.

After failing to grow a good looking beard of consistent thickness I went with a thick stubble for years, trimming it down as a weekly ritual, until I became unemployed for over a year following Iceland's economic crash in 2008. After about six months I stopped caring and completely stopped shaving--turns out I had developed the ability to grow a full magnificent beard in the meantime!

I love my beard. A lot. It's long, thick and wavy, reddish-brown/coppery with golden highlights. I prefer to keep my beard on the scruffy side, although generally not as scruffy as my twitter avatar. I give it a good trimming on a monthly basis, after which it will look more like my facebook profile picture (although it's unusually short in that picture, as it was taken on my wedding day last September--it's currently about double in volume and length).

I have only once completely shaved my beard off once since January 2009 (last January, because of skin problems following a nasty flu) and I found a pinker version of my dad from my youth in the mirror (I also lost a lot of weight during my unemployment, which played into the effect).

But yeah. Love beards. The world needs more beards. Give Aquaman and Green Arrow their goddamn beards back!

Homicidal_Squirrel said:

Alcohol does amazing things.
Almost died and still maintained a manly beard. Well done, sir. Well done.

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Well, it helps that I started that beard in early September and then slept in a medically induced coma for 6 1/2 weeks while "I let it grow" for a bit there.

Scott DeWar said:

Well, it helps that I started that beard in early September and then slept in a medically induced coma for 6 1/2 weeks while "I let it grow" for a bit there.

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So you grew that bears while sleeping? That's even more impressive. Most people would have to go do many stuff to grow a manly bears like that.

Uh, I am guessing you meant beard, not bears. Buy yup, did that in my sleep

Also when I went into septic shock, my blood pressure dropped so low my kidneys shut down, but this is not what I want to tell you . . . . .

to counter this, they hit you with epinephrine where my heart rate was at a constant aerobic speed like a mega-marathoner for 3 1/2 weeks,but this is not what I want to tell you . . . . .

if you calculate it out I ran about 100 miles in my sleep. Not that is impressive eh?

I wore a moustache for some 15 years. Luckily, I'm old enough to claim that this period is a long gone one.

Nowadays I shave every two or three days and am happy with it.

Interesting, by the way, that so many of you claim to wear a moustache plus goatee. Some kind of roleplayer uniform?

Scott DeWar said:

Uh, I am guessing you meant beard, not bears.

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It was on my phone when I posted that. Sometimes autocorrect corrects thing incorrectly. This time it seems to have improved the statement. I'm going to stick with 'bears.'

Buy yup, did that in my sleep

Also when I went into septic shock, my blood pressure dropped so low my kidneys shut down, but this is not what I want to tell you . . . . .

to counter this, they hit you with epinephrine where my heart rate was at a constant aerobic speed like a mega-marathoner for 3 1/2 weeks,but this is not what I want to tell you . . . . .

if you calculate it out I ran about 100 miles in my sleep. Not that is impressive eh?

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Yeah, that's fairly impressive, but a bit slow. Matt Carpenter ran the Leadville Trail 100 (100 mile ultra marathon) in 15 hours and forty two minutes. He doesn't have a beard, but still…

(When I groom) I have a goatee. Without facial hair, I look really young.

Interesting, by the way, that so many of you claim to wear a moustache plus goatee. Some kind of roleplayer uniform?

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I've played D&D with around 20 other guys in the ~10 years I've had my mustache/goatee, and I think only 1 other fellow had the same. There was 1 guy with a full beard, and 1 guy with major side burns, but all the others were clean shaven. I work with over a dozen [not counting the 2 females] engineers, scientists, and software developers, and I'm the only one with any facial hair.

Maybe it's just the folks here on ENWorld who are especially stylish and cool

Bullgrit

Homicidal_Squirrel said:

Yeah, that's fairly impressive, but a bit slow. Matt Carpenter ran the Leadville Trail 100 (100 mile ultra marathon) in 15 hours and forty two minutes. He doesn't have a beard, but still…

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But did he do it in his sleep?? I think not.....

Nellisir said:

But did he do it in his sleep?? I think not.....

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I don't think Matt Carpenter sleeps. He isn't human.