Ever since I bought a Venus Embrace razor, I shave my legs daily.

It’s soooo easy.

No soap.
No shaving cream.
Just zip, zip, done.

But recently I noticed my old razor sitting forlornly on a shelf in the medicine cabinet. And, along with it, three unused blades.

Frugality taunted me.

So, I temporarily retired the Venus Embrace and, ahem, embraced my old razor.

But the darn thing has a too-small handle.
It has a super-small shaving head.
There’s no handy-dandy shower holder.
And there’s no slime bar.

(Gillette calls it a “ribbon of moisture” but, hey, they’re not on my client list, so as a consumer, I call it “slime bar.”)

It’s a real pain to shave with the new/old razor.
And so I don’t.
Well, not often, anyway.

The problem is not the razor.

The problem is that it’s the WRONG TOOL for the job (shaving in the shower vs. shaving in the tub).

Which got me to thinking …

That’s what happens to writers: sometimes we use the wrong tool for the job.

And it doesn’t work as well — or as easily — as the right tool.

Take, for example, a thesaurus.

This one is good.
But this one is even better.

Why?

Because one is more literal and one is more thought provoking.

One gives me easy options but the other forces me to be more creative.
And that makes me a better writer.

Which tools do you use? Which tools make you a better writer — and which tools need to be dumped from your toolbox?