Awww...Crap.

So close...

and yet so far.

Last Saturday I took Kawaguchi-sensei's Tamahanage straight back to him. I had taken it back to the hones--using slurry on my razor-sized Nakayama, refreshing the slurry 5 times, and making sure I got the color even across the bevel. I got what I thought was a nice edge, and I DID NOT SHAVE TEST IT. I wanted to check my eye, see if I could see what Kawaguchi-sensei was seeing. It looked evenly and deeply white across both sides of the bevel to my eyes.

So I took the razor in, thoughts of honing nirvana racing through my eyes...and he took a close look. Looked again. Stropped on his arm. Looked again.

Smiled and said "97 out of 100."

Crap.

"Right here." He showed me a spot at the very heel, where the razor had not apparently hit the hone consistently. The color was not even, it was still a bit too shiny, and there was my three points.

Crap.

However, there was some consolation. He told me once I got my last three points...I could have the razor.

His Tamahagane Iwasaki.

Soooooo....not so much crap.

So I took the razor home, a wee bit elated. And of course, I figured it was time to shave.

Here's where it gets fun...

I stropped on the lovely Kanayama #90000 strop and prepped for my shave.

Lathered up with Truefitt & Hill 1805, and shaved. Smooth...so smooth. Damn, what a smooth shave.

But...

I was bleeding in odd places. Little stripes and scratches...

Weird.

Too weird.

I look at the blade and notice an odd sparkle. A glint where it shouldn't have been...

A chip in the edge.

The edge of that lovely Tamahagane razor...and the only way to get rid of it is to remove so much lovely, lovely steel.

Crap.