"Trade one red paper clip for one fish pen," MacDonald said, "for one door knob, for one camping stove, for one generator, for one instant party, for one snowmobile, for one trip to Yahk [in British Columbia, Canada], for one cube van, for one recording contract, for one year of rent in Phoenix, Reboot electronics. When you need to reset your modem or router, a paper clip is the ideal tool for pressing that tricky-to-reach reset button. Bend it into a key-like shape, that is, a long wire with a handle at the end. You hold the handle and use the extended wire to press in the internal reset button. A brief excursis on paper clips as art and life. 101 Uses for a Paper Clip Collected by Xrysostom. A friend of mine was challenged by a professor to provide 101 uses for the common paper clip. She passed the request on to an email list we share and some of us contributed to what she'd begun.