Attend the tale of Sweeney Tom

There's a reason why I don't like to shave: because I suck at it. Exhibits A and B of this lack of shaving prowess were staring me in the face this morning, twin scars on my upper lip directly below my left and right nostrils that were the mocking reminders of not one but two painful nicks I acquired while attempting to shave yesterday. The fact that razors are becoming ever more deadly doesn't exactly help matters much, either. Whereas before if I screwed up I drew blood only once, now with these godawful triple and quadruple blades I can really do some 300-style damage.

In college I was legendary for my shaving blunders, so much so that the Sondheim-inclined in my dorm referred to me as Sweeney Tom (after of course the 1979 hit musical Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, which was itself based on a 1973 play of the same name that had been inspired in turn by a 1956 song, a 1936 film, as well as another play all the way back in 1847, and will be turned again into a movie sometime this year starring Johnny Depp in the title role. The strange history of this urban legend turned fiction turned back into urban legend is a fascinating one!):

Swing your razor wide, Sweeney!
Hold it to the skies!
Freely flows the blood of those who moralize...



Not a pleasant sight. Fortunately Lifehacker has got my back on this one:

If the wads of toilet paper or styptic pencils are just not doing it for ya anymore, you might want to try ChapStick the next time you nick yourself shaving.

Fortunately, I had a reluctant eager helper here in the Lifehacker labs to test out this theory; it does actually work pretty well on the smaller cuts, however, you probably do not want to use the lip balm on the bigger cuts and I would recommend staying away from the flavored stuff; it leaves a weird color on your face. — Wendy Boswell

(Whoa. Two hacktastic posts in a row! What are the odds?)