Rubenerd

I’m a big fan of Post-it Notes and their various clones and offshoots. I find them useful for labelling computer hardware to indicate whether I’ve tested it, on what date, and its functional state. I still maintain a database of purchase dates, serial numbers, and model codes, but it’s super helpful seeing the state of something at a glance.

The only major frustration I’ve had with these notes is their prepensity to snag and fall off, especially if the hardware to which they’re adhered is in a box with lots of other kit that gets rummaged through.

If only the adhesive strip were larger, so there’d be no loose end of the paper to pull and come off… right?

As if heeding my call, a few years ago Post-it Notes came out with exactly this. I forget what they were called, but the adhesive strip ran across the entire back surface of the paper. It was still loose enough that the note could be removed cleanly, and without undue frustration, but the additional surface area and lack of a “flappy part” worked wonders. The notes were just as easy to use and remove as before, only this time they didn’t snag or fall off. I still have old hard drives and NICs with these notes on them today. They were brillant.

Alas, as I’ve come to expect with consumer hardware, the perfect thing isn’t allowed to stick around for long. These Post-it Notes with adhesive across their entire back surface haven’t been available in Australia for a while. Trips to regular office supply stores proved unfruitful, and even online stores and auction sites returned nothing. It was getting to the point where I was questioning whether they ever existed, or if they were even Post-it Note branded at all. I mean, I thought they were.

Enter Muji, the upscale Japanese lifestyle store that sells everything from desktop fans and notebooks, to house slippers and Japanese-style curry powder. Sitting on a shelf in their Chatswood store was exactly what I was after:

You could say these notes are the MariaDB to the MySQL of fully-adhesive Post-it Notes. It’s not a drop-in replacement, in the sense that its natural paper colour does look slightly different from the Post-it Notes it’s complementing in my parts boxes. It also has a small flap less than a centimetre wide without any adhesive to provide a surface to grip and remove each sheet, though thankfully this lacks the leverage to inadvertedly remove the entire note from the hardware to which its attached through accidental snagging. They’re also not quite as sticky, but I’m not left wanting additional adhesion. Otherwise, it behaves exactly as I’d want and expect. Which is great!

So there you have it. If you want the best sticky notes, and you have access to a Muji, buy a stack of them. I know I will be.