New Beard's Eve - Because All Good Beards Must Come to an End

Some people loved my beard. I know because they would say things like "Hey, love your beard!" or "Great beard man." Other people had not so much love for the beard and they would say things like "Your beard is silly"* or "Dude, your beard is getting a bit out of control".

In fact, towards the middle of December, once I passed the 4 month milestone I had to agree that my beard was starting to look a bit er..unkempt. But I was allowing it to become so because I had already determined my exit strategy from bearded life. I decided to host a new year's eve beard shaving party at my parents house near Toronto where I had scheduled a 10 day stopover for the holidays on my way from Argentina to Bangkok.**

In early November I set up an event page in facebook for a new year's eve party and, so people might feel more involved, invited anyone who wanted to to grow a beard which they could likewise shave off on what I was calling 'New Beard's Eve'.

The main reason I set it up so far in advance was that I was due to be travelling in South America and specifically trekking in the Andes for a few weeks ending in mid December which I figured might be a bit late to schedule a new year's eve party. Since I also knew that access to the internet would be sporadic and I wouldn't be able to answer questions and generally keep up the hype I appointed Matt as administrator of the event in my absence. Initially he was less than enthusiastic***, but once he came up with the title 'Beardministrator' which he could use when referring to himself in the third person (eg. 'The Beardministrator would like to remind everyone...etc.) he was ok with it.

Not only was he ok with it he took to it like a duck who was growing an awesome beard would to water ( basically such a duck would take to water the same as a normal duck but would be more cool due to his wicked beardedness). In the 20 days that I was offline trekking in the Andes, he continually hyped up the event and generally raised the 'beardthusiasm' to incredible levels. Not only had he and my other brother Steve started growing beards but so had my good friend Sean from high school.

There were now going to be four of us shaving off our beards on New Beard's Eve. And the lads were exchanging notes about how their beard growing was coming along and transformed the event from just a vague concept that I came up with one day while wondering how long I should keep my beard, to a ligitimate 'Event' that now even had an acronym: NBE.

Evidence of the enthusiasm include the following magazine covers:



and:


And to top it off, my bearded breatheren****had even gone so far as to order NBE hoodies that even said 'STAFF' on the back and VIP shirts for the ladies which all came out on Christmas morning after I unwrapped mine.


Having a custom made NBE hoodie really fired me up and looking back it's hard to say which was more fun, the final planning stages or the actual event.

Planning was excellent becuase it gave us a chance to flex our creative muscles a bit. Like creating the Beard Trivia Game or Jeap-Beard-y using the latest PlayStation 3 quiz game that lets you upload your own Q and A like: Q: "Who wrote the line: To Beard, or not to Beard, that is the question?" A: William Shakesbeard. We came up with 31 more just like it!

We also created the Great Hall of Beards featuring great beards of history so people would know they entered the right house:

There was also the NBE Guest Orientation packs which included a fake beard for all those who did not or were incapable of growing their own beard:

The fake beard came with graphical instructions for how to wear it similar to the lifejacket instructions on airplanes. "Don't forget to secure your own beard first before helping others."

The night itself was really good fun and I got to catch up with great friends who I don't see that often. Not eveyone could stay late due to the fact that their small children require a lot of attention and have more enthusiasm for the snack table than the official NBE Beard Shaving Centre but it was nice to see them all the same. Still, I declare that NBE 2008/2009 was a big success. As a group we went from looking like this:

to looking like this:


Passing through various stages like this:

this:


and this:


Until the result was four clean shaven "gentlemen".*****

I would like to point out that for me, growing a beard while travelling was easy and fun and all part of the adventure but I think it took real guts for Matt, Steve and Sean to start growing beards in Mid-November with the sole objective of shaving on NBE all the while still working and living their 'normal' lives. Thanks guys! It was a fun night, and going from this guy:

to this guy:


on NBE wouldn't have been the same without you.

In the end my 2008 beard travelled with me through 8 countries and lasted from August 15, 2008 until the wee hours of new year's eve which, if you're counting, and I am, is 140 days assuming you count Friday August 15th as day 0 which I do. Whatever the count, it shattered my 2007 Project Chabal/Beardvember beard which only made it to 67 days but was still pretty impressive.

The clean shaven adventures of Dave continue. Next stop: Bangkok!

Photos: 1)DG having just applied mousse to the beard to y'know make it stylish and whatnot. 2) Hanging out chez Gerhard with a nice xmas nogg doing some light beard related reading 3) Matt taking care of some last minute Beardministrator business. 4-5) Magazine covers made by the Beardministrator 6) Beardthusiasm at its best with the new NBE shirts. 7) Sean and Matt in the 'Great Hall of Beards' that's Darwin in the background Al. Samuel de Champlain was the other one you couldn't guess. Excellent guess on Czar Nicolas though. 8) Matt demonstrating proper fake beard technique. 9-10) The beards before and after. 11-13) The 'durings' 14-15) more before and after.

*Sounds better when coming from a Malagasy girl in french 'votre barbe est drole' or something to that effect.
**Some may not consider this to technically be 'on the way' but it was the way that I took
***I think his initial reaction was something exactly like 'Wait a minute, how did I get to be administrator. I am not a beard Curator by anymeans I am still a beard noob. I am only 3 weeks and 1 day into said beard and it does not warrant any kind of administrator privlidges. oh.. I;m off to climb a mountian.. can;t talk now have great bearded adventures to take part in. well yer not the only one thats busy.. in fact as you have so previously pointed out you are probably the least busy as you are on yer vacation'
****Matt came up with that handle. Further evidence of his outstanding performance as Beardministrator.
*****Technically 3 since Matt didn't finish the job until the next morning and was actually passed out sleeping on the couch while we were saying final goodbyes to our beards. But hey, as Beardministrator he's entitled to do what he wants without people giving him grief about it eh?