There was a time when your computer mouse needed a mouse pad to be used correctly. These days, your mouse likely uses optical and laser technologies, and your mouse pad’s services are no longer required (although gamers still swear by them). Before you throw your old pad away, however, consider that there might be other uses—like these solutions to common household problems.
Protect your stuff
Mouse pads are durable and padded, which makes them ideal protection for just about any surface. You can buy oversize mouse pads that can cover your entire desk. Gamers use these huge mouse pads to make it easier to play games that require a lot of mouse movement, but these pads also protect the surface of your desk from wear and tear.
Mouse pads can also be cut to line drawers and kitchen cabinets, providing a soft, protective surface for your breakables that also protects the inner surfaces from dents, scratches, and moisture.
If you worry about furniture scratching your floors, you can prevent damage by gluing pads to the bottom of a table, chair, and couch legs. This will also prevent your furniture from sliding around too much, and the whole project requires a pair of scissors, some glue, and about 1 minutes.
If you don’t always cook your meals at home, you might not actually own a trivet—something you put hot plates and pots on to protect your table’s surface. In a pinch, a mouse pad will do just fine subbing in for a trivet—and a mouse pad can, in fact, be your official trivet if you want, saving you money and the trouble of finding storage space for one more thing.
Make your life easier
Soft-close cabinetry is life-changing, especially if you grew up in a house where every single family member slammed those kitchen cabinets shut like they were angry at them and now you have kitchen cabinet PTSD. Cutting an old mouse pad into small squares or circles and gluing them to the top and bottom outside corners of cabinet doors and the tops of drawers won’t make them “soft-close,” technically, but will reduce or eliminate the banging noise when you slam them shut.
If you’re opening your cabinet to retrieve a jar of something you just can’t open, the mouse pad can help there, too. The soft, pliable aspect of mouse pads combined with their grippy underside makes them ideal jar openers. If you don’t have a real jar opener or gripping pad in the house, a mouse pad stashed in a kitchen drawer will do the job admirably.
Entertain guests
If you lack placemats for a social gathering, a few larger mousepads will protect your surfaces from drips and crumb. If you have an old oversize mousepad that covered your whole desk, you can give it a quick wash, then cut it into four equal-sized pieces for a matching placemat set that will also protect your table from hot plates.
If you’re going to have people over, you need to protect your furniture from water stains—and yes, you can use cut up a mousepad into a set of coasters. Unlike other, lesser coasters, these will stay in place. This is especially fun if your mousepad has a cool design on it.
