Well, the beard has definitely come in handy over the last week. Austin was hit by an ice storm that basically shut the whole city down. After some of the ice melted and I went back to work, I took a walk around the capitol building. By the time I got back to the library, ice had formed in my beard, proving its worth as protective fur.

Oops, missed a couple days. Oh well. In addition to trimming the moustache on a regular basis, I've also just started trimming around the corners of my jaw. That area grows faster than the rest and tends to get scraggly.

Pucker up, it's Valentine's Day!

And we've passed one month already! It seems like only yesterday my beard was just cute little stubble. Sigh, they grow up so quick.

Drat, I missed day 25! (You'd think I had other important things to do ... Sorry.)

Didya hear 'bout the beard growin' contest up in Shamrock, Texas? There's a movie about it, which made it into the SXSW Film Festival.

It's long enough for Baby Guthrie to grab now. Ouch. And he could be a little less gleeful when I yelp. Pain should not be entertaining.

I think it's almost time to put all these pictures together in a nice animation, don't you?

Three weeks. It's a beard. Now, attention will slowly turn away from growth alone and move toward maintenance - trimming, combing, styling. Hey, since I don't have any hair on the top of my head worth fretting over, the beard naturally gets the red carpet treatment.

Give us this day our daily beard. Man cannot live on beard alone. Beard and circus. Break Beard with Brad. It's the best thing since sliced beard. (Sick, yet?)

Considering that the entire US is falling into the next ice age, I'm glad I decided to start growing my beard again. Has it ever been this cold in South Central Texas?

I just wish they had a "Best Blogger's Beard" category. You know you'd vote for me. (:

...

It's about as much fun as watching paint dry, isn't it?

Two weeks! W00t.

Gabriel doesn't like it when I kiss him right now because my face is pokey. He usually loves affection, but each time I kiss him, he looks at me as if to say, "Please stop that."

Some people like to shave the cheeks. This streamlines the beard. Nothing wrong with that. But I usually grow a beard so that I don't have to shave so much. As it is, I still shave my neck even when I grow a beard (although you couldn't really tell by this picture). Long story short, I leave the cheeks alone.

I had an architecture professor who always kept his beard trimmed at exactly this length. No shorter, no longer. He was annoying and pompous as hell. Just before finals, I dreamed that I followed him out to his car one night and shaved the Parthenon into his left cheek and the Temple of Hatshepsut into his right. I made a B in the class.

It's long enough to fiddle with now. Mmmm, soft ... fuzzy ... but touching it all the time makes it itch. Touching the beard, I mean.

Getting a little darker, a little thicker. Some people call it scraggly. I prefer the term 'artistic'.

Of course I realize only now that the camera has been pointing this whole time right at the one spot on my chin where hair is even remotely sparse. See that nice, round, ball-like chin? There'll be a flesh-colored Death Star there until the beard grows long enough to cover it.

Here's a week's worth of beard. It's totally George Michael. You can see a definite "aura" under the chin - a good sign that we're well on our way to real beardage.

Okay, we're smack dab in the middle of the, "Dude, you need to shave already" period. This is the worst phase of beard growing. Is he growing a beard? Did he just forget to shave? What the--? Patience is the key to enduring this period.

Yep, it's definitely stubblin' up. And notice that the neck has been successfully removed.

Getting more stubbly, darker. Notice the neck growth. I very much dislike the neck growth. It will be eradicated immediately.

Stubbly. Five o'clock shadow two days late.