egnor's already suggested a keyboard cleaning tray to catch crumbs, but I just dropped a little crumb of cheese into my keyboard and it nestled neatly in the space between O, P and L. There it sat, where no tray could help it. And could I pluck it out with fingers or knife? No.
What I suggest is a set of tweezers with a specially-shaped head to remove particles of milk-based foodstuff from keyboards, efficiently and without pushing it through the bottom to clog up my cleaning tray.
Incidentally, my story has a happy ending. I turned the keyboard upside down and shook it. But how much less effort the tweezers would be, and what better to stimulate an economy slipping into recession?-- pottedstu, Sep 17 2001 "How much less effort would the tweezers be?" Not much, considering I'd lose them and have to go look for them on a regular basis. Maybe someone should suggest a monitor-mounter tweezer caddy.-- nick_n_uit, Sep 17 2001 Maybe the tweezers should slide into the keyboard casing, like on a Swiss army knife. Come to think of it, as long as you're snacking by the computer, you might as well have slide-out silverware and an extendable dinner tray.-- francois, Sep 18 2001 Don't let the nay-sayers get you down [pottedstu]. This is a good idea - though I'd just pop the keycaps and remove the foreign material, something I do periodicaly to clean my keycaps anyway.-- phoenix, Sep 18 2001 phoenix, thanks. But any procedure involving removing keys from the keyboard is surely fraught with danger. I have enough trouble remembering where the tilde is when it's right in front of me, how on earth am I to put it back in the right place? Or is there a number underneath? I don't dare try it out, at least not until I've invented a device for removing key tops lodged in ventilation grates/furniture/cats.-- pottedstu, Sep 19 2001 I need one. I also am reluctant to pop out the keys off the keyboard. I *always* eat at my desk. There is nowhere else to eat, unless I suddenly developed a tolerance to students, academics, and large numbers of people in general. Coffee on the keybaord I have so far avoided...UB I must take issue with your adverb. //Alternately// dear oh dear. This would mean that pottedstu eats at a table every second meal, but remains keyboard crumb-dropping at other times. Did you mean 'alternatively'?-- lewisgirl, Sep 19 2001 Why would you need to bother with tweezzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.......nevermind-- shaggysin, Sep 19 2001 random, halfbakery