So I gave the old layers of hairspray a scrubbing - and it took some effort to get it off, too. However, upon laying down more hairspray, the same thing happened: it stayed tacky for only a minute or two, then dried to a hard-slick finish. That sort of suggests that there's some sort of environmental issue, but I'd been using hairspray over the last year in all sorts of typical Oregon weather, so that really hasn't changed. It makes me think that they've changed the hairspray formula in some fashion.

-Crawford