Hot take: a bent paperclip saved my whole afternoon yesterday

My closet rod snapped clean in half on Tuesday when I went to grab a winter coat... it was one of those cheap wire ones from the apartment. I didn't have a replacement rod or even a drill to mount a new bracket. So I grabbed a paperclip from my desk, straightened it out, and bent it into a little hook shape. Then I used it to hang the broken rod on the remaining bracket by wrapping the hook around the rod end and the bracket nub. It held the whole pile of coats for the rest of the day while I figured out a real fix. Has anyone else used random desk supplies to bodge a closet back together? I felt like a total MacGyver but I bet there's a better trick out there.

2 comments

2 Comments

evah4017h ago

Paperclips have saved me more times than I'd care to admit. Last winter my oven rack handle fell off and I used a couple of them twisted together to make a temporary pull loop. It worked fine for months until the rack finally gave out and I had to buy a whole new oven. That little hook trick you did sounds like a proper stopgap though, nothing wrong with a bit of creative engineering when you're in a pinch.

jason7316h ago

Yeah I get that it worked in a pinch but calling that a "bodge" is generous. That paperclip hook is just begging to snap under any real weight, especially if a heavy coat swings the wrong way. You got lucky it held for an afternoon, but a proper fix with a metal hanger or a spare screw would have been way safer long term.