The Rules of Bureaucracy and the Table of Excuses...

(These are perfect, what with being a Federal employee...)

1. Preserve thyself.
2. It is easier to fix the blame than to fix the problem.
3. A penny saved is an oversight.
4. Information deteriorates upward.
5. The first 90% of the task takes 90% of the time; the last 10% takes the other 90%.
6. Experience is what you get just after you need it.
7. For any given large, complex, hard-to-understand, expensive problem, there exists at least one short, simple, easy, cheap wrong answer.
8. Anything that can be changed will be, until time runs out.
9. To err is human; to shrug is civil service.
10. There's never enough time to do it right, but there's always enough time to do it over.

To save time for this department and yourself, please give your excuse by number. The list below covers most situations.

1. That's the way we've always done it.
2. I didn't know you were in a hurry for it
3. That's not in my department.
4. No one told me to go ahead.
5. I'm waiting for an OK.
6. How did I know this was different?
7. That is his job, not mine.
8. Wait till the boss comes back and ask him.
9. I forgot.
10. I didn't think it was very important.
11. I'm so busy, that I just can't get around to it.
12. I thought I told you!