We’ve had an email from Katherine, asking:

My niece left about half a tube of hair spiking gel behind at my house; I’m not about to change my style and use it myself but it’s not worth the postage to post it back… Any ideas on what to do with hair spiking glue other than spike hair?

The brand, if this makes a difference, is Schwarzkopf ‘Got2b’. If I were a chemist I might be able to work out from the ingredients list whether it can be basically used like ordinary glue!

We’ve got a few half-tubes of gel in our bathroom cupboard too - donated from by a friend who no longer needed them when John was going through his faux-fro phase last year - so I’d like some ideas for this too. I guess we could repeat the donation but I don’t know anyone who would use it - like with the other half-used toiletries, it could go to a shelter I guess but I don’t know whether they’d prefer just practical things.

I suspect hair wax/oil type products could be reused for lubrication purposes in the same way as most greases but gels tend to dry sticky or crispy so couldn’t be used for that.

Any suggestions though? Or ideas about the glue thing? I wonder if like toothpaste it can be used as a temporary fix for, eg, sticking light posters to walls… anyone know or care to test it?

(Photo by asterisco)

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We’ve had an email from Victoria, saying:

My grandfather has moved out of the house and left a very large collection of used razor blades. For what reason he never seemed to throw them out and just let them pile up in a bathroom cabinet. Can this item be recycled?

I’m presuming Victoria means safety razor type blades - not fully disposable razors or straight blades.

If they’re just metal (without plastic casing) then I suspect they can be recycled in the same way as other steel (most household waste sites have special containers for scrap metal) but what about reuses?

(Photo by iannai)

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Deodorant bottles were one of the first things we featured on the site but Julie has a bit of a spin on that suggestions:

Could you help me with what I could possibly do with toiletries such as deodorant, body lotion that have either not been used or of they have only once. These have either irritated the skin or just don’t like them now.

It seems such a waste to throw them away, so I would welcome any ideas of organisations that might benefit from them.

I’ve had the irritating the skin problem with some deodorants too and now they’re sitting in the bathroom cupboard until the day I, I don’t know, develop leather-like lizard skin that can’t be irritated by anything in a roll-top bottle.

I suspect like with old cosmetics and unused but not required sanitary towels/tampons one answer might be a local women’s or homeless shelter - but any other suggestions?

I think I remember something about some body lotions being used as a moisturiser/softener on old leather but have no idea where I picked that up - anyone know either way?

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We featured make-up itself a while ago and have also looked at mascara wands and nail varnish, but Annie G has come up with a clever idea for old pressed powder compacts:

As I was coming to the end of my blusher I wondered what I could do with the plastic container afterwards and had a great idea. I travel by train regularly and found the empty blusher container makes a compact and secure travel case for flattish earrings.

That is a great idea - I always need a little baggie or something to keep my earrings in when we’re going away, but that’s a better idea because it’s solid and I’d be less likely to squash them by mistake.

Any other clever ideas for them though?

(Photo by esrasu”)

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We’ve had another email from our most prolific suggester of things [Am] (aka Delusion):

Me again! While at my parents I caught my mother about to throw out some very old curlers. I managed to snag them before they reached the rubbish bin and thought they would be a good suggestion idea.

There are two kinds, one are cylinders with elastic looped at the bottom that attaches to the ’stopper’ part and the other kind are spongy, bendy ones. Any ideas for usage to stop them being dumped in a landfill?

If they’re bendy enough, I imagine the bendy ones would be a great addition to a tool box - you could use them for, say, holding pipes together or tying a garden plant to a support (the foam would stop the wire digging into the stem).

And for the cylinder ones, mini-bird feeders? Or if you could block each end, fill with lavender (or the like) to use as an air-freshner or in a drawer/wardrobe?

Any other ideas?

(Photo by [Am] - thanks :) )

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