Government Stuff

When I first started working for the Government, someone (cannot remember who) handed me a sheet of paper with a list of vernacular, or stuff that people say in various meetings and situations.  I have added to the original list, though I do not claim authorship.

Hard Stuff:
Trying to put lipstick on a pig
Juggling cotton balls in a hurricane
Pushing a rope
Trying to unscramble eggs
Tough nut to crack
Boiling the ocean

Easy Stuff:
Low Hanging Fruit

Getting stuck in the small stuff:
Pole vaulting over mouse turds
Searching for head lice
Stuck down in the weeds
Nitnoids

...The big stuff:
Big elephant in the room
Camel's nose sticking out of the tent
Long pole in the tent

Unhappy Stuff:
I don't mean to pee in your Cheerios

Programmatic Stuff:
Budget Austerity
Rice Bowl
Run it up the flagpole
Cross-pollinate
Re-invent the wheel
Breaking the stove pipes
Capture the subset
Birthing a program
Preacher in a parachute
A/n {insert saying} solution (e.g. A six sigma solution or a 90% solution)

Too Much Stuff:
Eat the elephant in one bite
Drinking from the fire hose

How to do Stuff:
Skin the cat from both ends
Peel the onion
Build-a-little, test-a-little
Mr. Potato Head approach
Chasing the ghost turd
Basting the turkeyAssume the spherical chicken

Source of stuff:
Bellybutton

How to think about stuff
Outside-the-box
Motherhood and apple pie

Random Stuff:
Cheese-eating Surrender Monkey
Cats & Dogs
Cut somebody's ear off
Is that a north-south head nod?
The self-licking ice cream cone
Slower than molasses running up-hill on a cold day
Axis of Weasils
Negadelphian
Self-Healing Software