I am hooked. More precisely, my apartment is hooked.
A previous owner has made abundant use of stick-on hooks and I find them in some surprising places and in surprising quantities.
I first became aware of them when storing my kitchen supplies. One cupboard has sixteen cup hooks. Sixteen! I use this cupboard for dry goods, and will remove the hooks if I can figure out how to do that cleanly. But every time I open this cupboard I wonder why someone needed so many cups or mugs.
The next hook that drew my attention is in my bathroom. It is a very large hook and it is placed below the bathtub rim. I cannot imagine what it could be used for. There are four additional hooks on the tiles around the tub and I use them for a squeegee, a back brush, and my shower scrunchie puff thingy. One hook is surplus to requirements.
There are also some hooks on the left wall of the hall closet, one of which looks as though it could be used to hang a purse: it is too close to the adjacent wall for a coat. One is too far down on the wall to be of any use I can think of, and one is an odd shape, so it probably was once attached to something else.
There are hooks beside the washer and dryer in their closet and hooks tucked far inside the guest room closet. I have removed stick-on hooks from the backs of two doors and from the edge of my bedroom window sill. And, just before Christmas, I tried to replace broken hooks on the underside of the patio roof. There are several there to hang a string of lights, but they are old and break easily so I gave up the effort.
Actually, all of these hooks have been there a long time. I can tell because the plastic has yellowed, they are fragile, and none of them has the kind of glue that you can pull away to leave the wall undamaged. These are old-school stick-on hooks, and I would love to know the best way to remove them.
Any advice will be much appreciated. More importantly, though, do you know what that big bathtub hook is for? If I knew that I might stop staring at it when I am, ahem, otherwise engaged. Thank you in advance for your insights.
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Update: I have successfully removed the hooks that were on drywall! I couldn’t figure out how to get GooGone behind the hooks, so I didn’t try that method. I asked a member of the staff at the local hardware store and he recommended slicing them off with this knife, and so that is what I did.
It pulled away the first layer of the drywall on one hook and left glue behind on the others, but it worked well enough. I used Polyfilla Speed Dry and a palette knife to create a thin layer of spackle, twice on each place, then I sanded them down.
When the areas were smooth enough for me, I gave them two coats of paint. Et Voila! It is as though there were never hooks in odd places.
Thank you all for your advice. I appreciate your support very much.
Snowbird of Paradise 
@snowbirdofparadise.com goo-be-gone or even just rubbing alcohol might help get the glue off. You might also need something very thin you can wedge in under the glue pad to peel it off incrementally.
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I’ll give it a try! Thanks, Meg.
Afterthought: I wonder if a hairdryer might help.
I didn’t use either GooGone or a hairdryer, but I have managed to remove some of the hooks.
@snowbirdofparadise.com Hm, if the bath hook is on the end of the bath that you lie in (not the faucet end) maybe it's for something you want to be able to easily reach while bathing, like a loofah. It's possible that the loofah has two homes, one for showering and one for bathing. On the other hand it would drip onto the floor, so I'm not sure!
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The big hook is at the faucet end, so it is still a mystery.
Edit to add: I wonder if it is not bath-related but toilet-related. Perhaps it held a mobility aid.
I still have the bath hooks, but I have added to the post to show how I removed the others.
I used one of those hooks years ago, changed my mind, and tore the dry wall removing it. I think I finaly have the wall adequately repaired, with many patient coats of spackle and new paint on the wall. I am following to see if you find an adequate solution. My only solution was to quit using that style of hook!
Haha! Thanks for confirming my suspicions, Lorna!
I have pretty much repeated your method. It turned out not bad, so I thank you for your advice.
Thank you Anne. Now my brain is fully engaged in figuring out the mystery of why someone would add a large, stick-on hook to the faucet end of their tub. Hmmm. I sell walk in tubs and I’ve been in literally thousands of houses and bathrooms, looking at bathtub situations, and I’ve never seen that aid. I agree that it might be for the toilet…maybe to hold a folded magazine or since it’s so old, the Readers Digest. Yep! I’m going with that and allowing my brain freedom.
I’m chuckling here, Sally. Yes, by all means, please free your brain. Readers Digest holder it is!
I have updated the post to show I how removed some of the hooks. I think I’ll hang on to the Readers Digest hook, though.
Ha!
Great job on the removal and restore!
Damn, faucet end of the tub. I was thinking it was for a small hand towel to keep hands dry while reading in the tub 🙂
Oh, that would be a great asset!
I have updated the post showing how I removed some hooks. I still have that bathtub hook, though.