“I was neat, clean, shaved, and sober, and I didn’t care who knew it.” – Raymond Chandler, ‘The Big Sleep’
Real quick: new The Line Break this week! We talked to Kiik Araki-Kawaguchi, author of maybe my favorite poetry book I read this year. Look, it’s not uncommon for me to come away from a podcast session like, “wow, that guest is my favorite person.” I was levitating after the Teo episode. But man, Kiik was just such a goddamn delight to talk to. So impossibly thoughtful, yet incredibly down-to-earth. May you enjoy listening to this episode as much as we did recording it. (Apple | Spotify | SoundCloud)
Noirvember columns should reflect something absurdly dystopian about contemporary living, without being speculative. That’s not a real definition of noir, but that’s sort of how I think about it. Kafka’s The Trial doesn’t usually get classified as noir, but I believe Josef K. would fit right in with James M. Cain protagonists. There should also be something secretive in the oppressing power—something as bombastic as ICE’s invasion of Chicago would be out-of-place in noir. Of course, the golden age of noir was around the time of Hitler’s rise to power: Hammet publishes Red Harvest in 1929, Chandler publishes The Big Sleep in 1939, Cain publishes Mildred Pierce in 1941. Then The Third Man in a 1949 is a movie that takes place immediately post-war. Noir didn’t stop after 1949, but those years were the nadir. Anyway, in this Noirvember of 2025, the first year of the second, more mask-off fascist Trump regime? I wanna talk about shaving. Specifically, shaving subscription services.
If we’re going to discuss my shaving habits, I might as well own up to not being able to grow a beard. When the top of your head is as luxurious as mine is, that’s not the end of the world. It is irritating that three-day stubble is absolutely inexcusable for me. All it does is accentuate my jowls and ratchet up the dirtbag levels. Not sexy dirtbag, though. More like unshowered. Anyway, I shave every day. There were a number of years where I shaved every other day. There was also a period of time where i tried to grow facial hair like Randy in Scream 2 or Josh Hartnett in Lucky Number Slevin, and the less said about that, the better. Point is, I’m not scraping off a full Steven Adams every morning. I do not need to change my razors enough, nor do I go through shaving cream enough, to really justify a shaving subscription service. Like Uber before that The Dollop episode, though, it seemed like something new worth trying because the old stuff wasn’t getting the job done.
The hook that got me into a shaving subscription service was mild annoyance at my Gillette products, and a podcast ad. I like to think I’m mostly immune to advertising, but if I have a vague complaint about a thing? I will seek out and fall for something in slicker packaging. Irish Spring soap felt vaguely itchy once when I was like 14. I tried out Old Spice body wash, a girl at school said I smelled good, and I’m still falling for Old Spice packaging 23 years later. Barbecue sauce is another great example—Sweet Baby Ray’s is fine, I guess, but you slap a Jack Daniels logo on the packaging or tell me it’s Carolina Gold? I’m all the way in, homie. So around age 27, vaguely frustrated with the standard Gillette products I’d used since age 13, I decided to try out a free trial. I signed up for a Harry’s subscription sometime around November or December. I know the month, because apparently, Mal either heard me complaining or just read my mind, because she signed me up for Dollar Shave Club as a Christmas gift. For what it’s worth, DSC had a better shaving cream (shave BUTTER, oh my god), and Harry’s had a more comfortable razor. I stuck with Harry’s, and even though I had my subscription set to refill on the least frequent setting, I soon began to accumulate boxes and boxes of shaving cream and spare razors.
Those boxes moved apartments with me. Twice. I am not one to waste, which meant I was taking them with me. Also, being not one to waste, I use razors probably way longer than what’s recommended. The razor has to actively leave stubble on my neck before I chuck this piece of metal and plastic in a trash can. The end result of that is: I don’t remember when exactly I cancelled this subscription, but it’s been at least a few years, and
I am.
Just.
Now.
Running out of razors and shaving cream.
I’ll admit plenty of culpability here: it wasn’t that hard to cancel, there were many times when I could have and simply didn’t make time for it. Here’s the thing, though: every single company now is counting on you being too lazy or too busy to cancel your subscriptions.
We don’t own DVDs anymore1, we pay higher and higher monthly rates to streamers to rent movies when we want. We can’t afford to own homes anymore, so we rent living space no matter if a pandemic is going on or the federal government is invading our cities. We’re too busy to cook for ourselves anymore, or even think about what we want to eat, so we outsource grocery shopping to meal kit services and their infinite packaging.
The subscription service model is based on capitalism’s constant need for churn, and is betting that the planet will never fill up with trash nor overheat from too much manufacturing or too much computer usage. I recognize I have some privilege saying this—even if my family is check-to-check, we are able to afford me freelancing and Mal working full time. Since my brain happens to get a real kick out of cooking and planning, I make grocery shopping and food dinner making a priority. All of that said, let me gently encourage you to interrogate whether or not you need certain subscriptions in your life.
We’re all hopelessly addicted to one or another—HBO and Apple Music for me. But it’s worth it to spend some time interrogating what you subscribe to. Because I feel like subscription services are to our economy what the Maltese Falcon was to Joel Cairo and Casper Kutman, or what Marcellus Wallace’s briefcase was to Jules and Vincent, or what Walter’s ringer was to the nihilists. And you already know this economy serves the Noah Crosses of the world.
Sorry you got an email,
Chris
- I mean, I do, but I never feel like I count in “we” ↩︎
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