# Ear and nose hair removal in men (TMI, for sure) **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 28, 2004, 7:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ear-and-nose-hair-removal-in-men-tmi-for-sure/276970 "2004-11-28T07:03:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![capnfutile](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e0b2c6/32.png) [@capnfutile](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/capnfutile)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2004, 7:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ear-and-nose-hair-removal-in-men-tmi-for-sure/276970/1 "2004-11-28T07:03:17Z")
So I’m in my thirties, which is to say, the hair follicles in my nose and ears have decided to start working a lot harder than they have a right to. I have several options for dealing with these hairs, including the following: 1: Plucking. Yeeouch. Makes my eyes water. 2: Trimming with scissors. Hard to do on the ears, afraid I’ll cut myself. 3: One of those electric trimmer thingies. Bought one. By Conair. Useless as teats on a bull. Simply doesn’t cut the hairs. 4: Sharks with frickin’ laser beams strapped to their heads. Had trouble finding these. My hair guy said he’s seen another barber singe them with a cotton bud (Qtip) soaked in meths (denatured alcohol). So I decided to give this a try. First problem, this emits a three-inch flame. So I pulled most of the cotton off the end and tried again. Works better, but there’s still a fine line between too much flame and no flame. Made everything smell like burnt hair for a while. Question - does anyone else use this method and what is your technique? Or, got any better ideas? capn ---
**Author:** ![Emperor\_Penguin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c2a13f/32.png) [@Emperor\_Penguin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Emperor_Penguin)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2004, 10:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ear-and-nose-hair-removal-in-men-tmi-for-sure/276970/2 "2004-11-28T10:31:15Z")
> [@capnfutile](#): > > … > 2: Trimming with scissors. Hard to do on the ears, afraid I’ll cut myself. > … > My hair guy said he’s seen another barber singe them with a cotton bud (Qtip) soaked in meths (denatured alcohol). So I decided to give this a try. First problem, this emits a three-inch flame. So I pulled most of the cotton off the end and tried again. Works better, but there’s still a fine line between too much flame and no flame. Made everything smell like burnt hair for a while. You’re afraid of cutting yourself, so as an alternative you decide to go with open flame? :eek: ! I don’t have a problem with the ear hair yet thankfully, but I do have to trim the ol’ nostrils every now and again. Frankly, if I don’t, they just grow to the point where you can’t tell where the beard ends and the nose hair begins. I have the same problem with the hair on my head and on my neck/back. My poor barber. I don’t know how he knows when to stop cutting. Anyways, for the nose I just use a cheap pair of craft scissors I have kicking around. I just insert and start snipping, making sure to rotate in order to deforest as much as possible. I usually lay them flat against the skin and go to town. I’m not even that careful, and I have yet to cut myself. I imagine that this is what I will do with my ears as well as I get older. ---
**Author:** ![simple\_homer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@simple\_homer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/simple_homer)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2004, 12:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ear-and-nose-hair-removal-in-men-tmi-for-sure/276970/3 "2004-11-28T12:14:18Z")
Thanks for deciding to trim your nose hairs, too many guys don’t, and it looks really nasty. I have a cheap battery-operated no-name nose hair trimmer that I bought at Wal-mart years ago, and it works fine for me. ---
**Author:** ![Joe\_Mahma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5daacb/32.png) [@Joe\_Mahma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joe_Mahma)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2004, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ear-and-nose-hair-removal-in-men-tmi-for-sure/276970/4 "2004-11-28T13:57:00Z")
For nose hairs, **Emperor Penguin** ’s method works fine. For the ears, I use the pop-up doohicky on my beard trimmer. ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2004, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ear-and-nose-hair-removal-in-men-tmi-for-sure/276970/5 "2004-11-28T14:06:58Z")
Nose, internal, scissors. Nose, external, plucking. Ears, electric hair clippers with no spacer attachment on it.