We were around at our friend’s house the other night when John spotted a very cool looking piece of computer circuitry in the bin – a broken motherboard.

I’ve been wanting broken circuit boards for repurposing for a while – but there were too many big plastic slots/connectors on it for what I had in mind (namely using pieces of the circuit board to make jewellery or large flat pieces as notebook covers).

What else could be done with it? Are there any companies/organisations that specifically collect them for cannibalising/reuse/recycling or should they just be disposed of with other electronic waste?

No, no, not the things that run around causing women to stand on chairs and scream in 1960s sitcoms (to paraphrase Douglas Adams), but the computer ones.

From our transistions through the various ages of mice, we’ve got a number of old filthy-rollered mice lying in cupboards around the place. As I mentioned on the old mouse mats post, we usually use track pads these days or optical mice if we need anything a bit more precise, so those old clogged up ones are just going to waste.

Any ideas? For either the whole mouse or any of its parts?

(Photo by weirdvis)