The New Hotness

While looking for something else, I found the old Trust Multimedia Mouse and discovered its nice grippy rubber surfaces had become adhesive slime. Graduated efforts with water, rubbing alcohol, and denatured alcohol being unavailing, I finally hit it with xylene and that did the trick:

Of course, xylene also wiped away the fancy button markings and irretrievably scarred the surface, but at least I can pick the mouse up without having it stick to my hand. Not that I pick it up that often, obviously.

Several other gadgets have a similar grippy finish, so now I know what to do when it turns gummy: throw the gadgets out…