Jess McCarter, San Francisco, CA

Nice stache, Jess! Much like the finest marble statues emerge from rough stone slabs, this fine mustache emerged from the ugly full-face beard which immediately proceeded it. This mustache lived a sadly short but glorious life of one day, on Halloween 2011, when Mr. McCarter shaved his beard into this lip sweater as part of a halloween costume, where he dressed as Humbert Humbert. Yes, that Humbert Humbert.

After his friends associated that mustache with that character, he felt as though he could not keep it. He made the shameful decision to shave of that beaut, but he reports that "my lady friends were highly disappointed that I didn't rock it for a whole week". Many times, after ladies enjoy a mustache for a week, suddenly they decide they love it and want to see it grown out for a month. It's a slippery slope for the ladies, one which ends in a world full of sweet, sweet lip whiskers.

Jess is the co-founder of Easy Creole catering company in San Francisco, California. Anyone who is nearby can find them serving at locations around the city, and everyone else can follow them on Twitter. Easy Creole serves the best creole food in the city, bar none. No word whether the other co-founder has a mustache.

At Stacheforge, there are no beards allowed. Jess was nervous about that rule when he submitted the second picture of him sitting in his vintage Austin Mini, but the stubby pricklers showing on his face in this picture hardly constitute a beard. If anything the face seen in this second picture is a face which cries out for a mustache.

Mustache Film Festival

Stacheforge readers will be interested in the Mustache Film Festival to be held in Maine this week.

Move over, Cannes. Maine will be playing host to its first-ever international mustache film festival, part of its annual pageant that celebrates the bristly facial hair. 

The festival set for March 30 in Portland will feature short films with storylines that involve mustaches or a main character who wears a mustache, said Nick Callanan, head of No Umbrella Media, a video production company organizing the event. 

The idea for the mustache film festival, believed to be the first of its kind, grew out of an annual mustache pageant held locally to benefit arts and cancer research organizations, he said. 

This year's 2012 Stache Pag will feature contestants wearing all manner of mustaches, from handlebars to horseshoes, Callanan said. There are also the walrus and Fu Manchu styles, he said. 

"It's just about men expressing themselves," he said.

Mustached Americans seek tax break for grooming products

As Congress pays lip service to Americans seeking tax reforms, an underrepresented constituency has a hairy proposition -- getting lawmakers to approve a $250 tax refund for mustached Americans.

Members of the American Mustache Institute traipsed up to Capitol Hill Monday -- while lawmakers were out of town for President's Day -- to seek a tax break for men with facial hair, who (AMI-authored studies show) are 38 percent better-looking than the rest of America.

But demonstrating that the organization is not biased, AMI Chairman Aaron Perlut, who claims to personally spend "somewhere between $1,000 to $1,500" annually on grooming products, said anyone with hair care costs would be eligible for the $250 annual tax refund.

Marc Sikkes, London, England

Nice stache, Marc! This mustache was grown for Movember 2011, as part of a team of men who work at the British Ministry of Justice, in the Legal Directorate. Cheerio! Their team name was the Dashing Tashers of Justice, but no word on how many tashers of justice were dashing. No, we have only this picture of Marc, comfortably reclined before this stately red accent curtain, with his carefully coifed faux bedhead and a lipbrow remarkably similar to his eyebrows.

Marc says that, as a lawyer, he entered into tense negotiations with his fiance, regarding ownership of his upper lip. She insisted that the exclusion principle in real property law gave her eminent domain over his facial hirsuteness, while Marc maintained that nuh uh, it was his face and he would grow whatever he wanted on it. This legal defense became known as The Castle Face Doctrine (because a

man's face is his castle), or colloquially, "Sikkes Said So". Nevertheless, despite having won the legal case, Marc succumbed to an embargo his wife placed on their private behavior, and he negotiated to give her artistic control over the mustache.

His fiance was aiming for "a 1940s look, like Clark Gable." For reference, here is a picture of Clark Gable -- judge for yourself the uncanny resemblence.

As always, send pictures of your sweet mouth hat to submit@stacheforge.com!

Movember Aftermath: Scott, Brian, & Doug

Nice staches, Scott, Brian, and Doug! Wow, today we have a triple treat of terrific nostril anchors! From left to right in this picture are Scott Meister, Brian Rossman, and Doug Graham. These three gentlemen make up three quarters of Movember Team Stacheforge and all work at Attainment Company in Verona, Wisconsin, making educational computer games, such as perhaps a game which would teach someone how to memorize the first 380 digits of pi, which is written on the wall behind them.

These are some nice boxcar-style old-fashioned mustaches, the kind that might have been in style when that Apple IIc in the background of the picture was manufactured.

Clearly these three men are all quite proud of their face-sprouts. While Scott and Doug assume casual poses, as if to say that they have already grown accustomed to having their manhood growing above their mouths for all to see, Brian gives the camera a smile which belies the message of his t-shirt: indeed, Brian does care, unlike the crazy nastyass honey badger.

Great job, boys. Our team didn't so much "raise money" but we did increase the number of mustaches in the universe, which is its own reward.

Movember Aftermath: Chril Plehal,

Nice stache, Chris!

Meet Chris Plehal, a comedy writer in New York City, who grew a mouth hat for Movember. Chris was so motivated to cure prostate cancer that he ruthlessly pursued donations, even sniping donors away from other Movember teams. Chris's team was SS+K, which raised over seven hundred dollars, and Chris himself raised over five hundred dollars! Way to go, Chris!

In this picture Chris holds a photo of his mustache hero, the one and only Sam Elliot, whose mustache is world famous. At the end of the month of Movember, Chris's lipfur wasn't quite as superlative as Sam's, but every young stache needs a role model for aspiration.

Because Chris is such a superstar, he actually created a video showing a picture from every day of Movember. You can see his stubble grow into manly whiskers. Mr. Plehal offered no hint on whether or not this Movember miracle would be sticking around for the new year, but even if not, it lived a beautiful and lippy life.

Michael Trapp, Jersey City, NJ

Nice stache, Michael! This suave lip fuzz works in New York City during the day, but commutes back home to Jersey City at night. It enjoys long walks on the beach, cold winters in New Hampshire, sliding across basement floors, and participating in Movember, where it is on the College Humor team. This nasal shadow was nicknamed "the Dirty Sanchez" by its friends, but its true name is "Merkin". Although it is not technically a merkin, the simile is obvious.

Merkin is worn proudly by Michael Trapp, shown in this photo with the reaction had by most people when confronted with such manly nostril roots: utter awe that such a beautiful thing could exist in this flawed universe in which we all toil. There is no word on whether Merkin will survive after Movember.