Horse 793 - Nine-Bladed!

Have you been following the race for supremacy in the men's razor category? Talk about competition!

Gillette launches the Mach3 with three blades.
Then comes the Mach3 Turbo - an upgrade.
This is followed by Gillette's Mach3 Turbo Champion - in a racy, Ferrari red. (It looks great on my bathroom counter, by the way.)

Not to be outdone, Schick comes out with the Quattro, featuring four blades. The Quattro hit the market just a few months after Gillette's Mach3.

Shavers are going to get more blades whether they need them or not. However, just like Moore's law (the observation that computer chips double in power every 18 months or so) it seems that technology as well as marketing determines the rate at which new blades are introduced.

Gillette responded with its new razor, The Fusion. It has five blades! Count 'em 1 2 3 4 5. And that's just on the front face of the shaving head. Get this, the Fusion also has an additional "precision blade" on the rear face of the shaving head. Excessive? Yes. Clever. Also yes! Who had ever thought of doing anything useful with the back of the razor blade cartridge.

I checked the price of a package of refill blades. At my supermarket the price tag was a whopping $33.95. And I thought that the Mach3 refills were sinful at $21.89 for the refill package. I actually feel guilty whenever I have to add razor blades to the weekly grocery shopping list.

I have not tried the Fusion yet... but I probably will. Gillette usually gets me with its marketing. Can anyone recommend a good home-equity loan to me? I'm going to need one if I have to begin purchasing Fusion razor blades.

What I want to know is what will happen in the near future? Six? For the demon shall bear a nine-bladed sword. Nine-bladed! Not two or five or seven, but nine, which he will wield on all wretched sinners, sinners just like you sir... hmmm.

Will we get to the stage of a 55 bladed razor which takes off the top 12 layers of dermis and then cauterises one's face? Surgeons in hospitals should be able to use 17 bladed scapels in case the first 16 missed. How closely shaven do you need to be anyway?