A/N: Okay, I used to play solitaire to calm me down when people annoyed me, now I write these. Which is why this section, Ministry of Magic, may be ever so slightly longer than the others and also why it may get just a touch more personal. I have issues with bureaucrats. Not even eighteen yet and I'm this bitter… Hmm.


50 GOLDEN RULES FOR MINISTRY OF MAGIC PERSONNEL

1. Should you be in your current position, only because the more suitable candidate declined the job then you should pretend you know nothing about this other candidate.

2. You should then write to this other candidate twelve or thirteen times a day, asking for advice. This advice may range from "Should we get involved in the Russian Quidditch dispute?" to "Should I wear the brown shoes or the black ones to the Italian Minister's cocktail party?"

3. When the other candidate then tells you that the most evil Wizard of our times is back and on the rampage, you should stick your head in the sand and pretend nothing is happening. The patented "Ignore it and maybe it'll go away" response is usually best when it comes to all-powerful lunatics, hell bent on genocide, after all.

4. If one serial killer escapes Azkaban then you should pull out all the stops in getting him back. Dementors on every street corner, Aurors on high alert, constant never-ending checks on school aged children who may be hiding him in the back of their jeans. I mean really, how much damage can an army of soul-suckers really do in a school? Hmm?

5. Continue the measures outlined in number 4, for a whole year. Then stop. Keep a small team of three or four Aurors on the job and try to forget the whole thing ever happened.

6. On the flip side of the coin, when ten Death Eaters break out of Azkaban, do nothing.

7. The best and most easily accessible place for a visitor's entrance is in a phone-box located on street, colloquially known as "Crack addict avenue". No one is ever inconvenienced by this and whoever thought of it deserves a medal.

8. If I am intending to enter the premises and slaughter everyone I see using Dark Magic far in advance of anything your puny mortal minds could comprehend I will, of course, submit to a search first and wear my nametag at all times.

9. During the aforementioned search, I fully expect my wand to be taken from me and registered. Because, of course, knowing the core of my wand and it's date of purchase will be of utmost importance as I reign blood, terror and chaos down on your contemptible little establishment. I will, naturally, continue to wear my nametag at all times.

10. Of course, when six school-aged children and a small platoon of Death Eaters decide to break into the Ministry of Magic, there should be no one there to do so much as blink an eye.

11. If you are the only person in the entire Ministry qualified to do your job -a job which may or may not relate to urgent matters, vital in the fight against Voldemort or continued running of the Magical World- feel free to take as many sick days as you like for no reason at all. Yes, we all realise that reliability is important, but so is your need to remain an enigma.

12. If, however, there are several people capable of doing your job, you must show up every day without fail and take charge of every situation. Even situations you have no right to take charge of. Incidentally, you should be about as useful in your current vocation as a condom machine in the Vatican.

13. If someone needs something done quickly, there will be paper work to fill in.

14. This paperwork will need to be filled out in triplicate, and will need seven separate forms to confirm that the first form was received and filled out in triplicate. After this there will be at least two more forms that will have to be signed by four separate people, only two of whom will be located within the building at any one time. After that you may deliver the initial request to have something done quickly. Your request will be dealt with as soon as Mary gets back from her three month tour of Asia, which she planned and saved up for while you were filling out forms in triplicate.

15. Thanks to some Bright-Spark's genius plan for inter-office messaging there will be at least seventy paper aeroplanes flying around the office at any one time. Despite having twenty-six separate charms to make these aeroplanes go faster, fly lower, look prettier, spiral more, etc, the Ministry of Magic and it's workers have yet to invent a method for preventing these aeroplanes from flying into one's eye. You have been warned.

16. No form, file, legislation, or memo will be named something easy to remember. There will either be an impossibly long identification number or a mind-boggling acronym. This means you will be forced to write lists of the relevant ID numbers and acronyms on small yellow notepads provided. Parenthetically, these notepads must be given ID numbers.

17. The highest-ranking administrator in any one office must, through some law of nature that no one is entirely clear on, be an insufferable fascist scumbag. No one may question this. After all, Hitler certainly got the trains to run on time… to be fair, they were going to Death Camps, but that's just one more comparison between Nazi Germany and the Ministry of Magic to add to the list.

18. In your place of work there will be a gorgeous, rather well endowed young woman. She should have first priority. Always. Even if she's a tea girl.

19. Notice to Aurors: Even though you will be risking your lives on an almost daily basis doing a job which very few other people are qualified to do, you will be one of the most poorly paid Ministry of Magic employees there is, perhaps paid even less than the aforementioned tea girl. You are not permitted to complain about this. Ever.

20. Notice to brand spanking new Aurors: You are the lowest of the low. All terrible jobs will be yours. All pointless, thankless jobs will be yours. If in doubt of the location of your cubicle just follow the flushing sound. If it's occupied, too bad. Your working conditions will only be improved when there is an even newer Auror, or when one of your superiors dies.

21. Notice to secretaries and assistants: Whilst most of your superiors are over seventeen, their IQ isn't. You will be expected to compensate accordingly.

22. Additional notice to secretaries and assistants: No matter what you may have been told your duties were, the basic definition of your job is to do three-times as much work as your immediate superior, let them take credit for it and keep your mouth shut when they blame you for their mistakes. While most people could hardly blame you for your less than superb job-enthusiasm, here in the Ministry of Magic we believe that intrinsic motivation is key.

23. So become intrinsically motivated, or you're sacked.

24. The publication of garish purple pamphlets, entitled "Protecting your home and family against Dark Forces!" is a much more important task for the Department of Magical Law Enforcement than actually doing something to stop the Dark Forces in question.

25. The statement of the blindingly obvious within these pamphlets is tremendously helpful to us all. Really.

26. You and all your personnel should be surprised when people are not comforted by said pamphlets.

27. Having spent the past year stopping the Daily Prophet from publishing anything that may imply the presence of one Dark Lord, you should continue to be nonplussed by the fact that recent articles in the very same Daily Prophet which detail what a bang-up job you are all doing, are doing nothing to ease the public's mood.

28. The fact that certain types of coral could've told you that Lucius Malfoy was a Death Eater should in no way detract from how surprised you all are that he was caught associating with them and participating in illegal activities.

29. Despite the fact that they allowed eleven dangerous convicts to waltz out the front door, you should be exceedingly surprised when the Dementors turn out to be unreliable.

30. All Ministry employees must pretend to know what the symbols on the ceiling in the Atrium mean.

31. All Ministry employees must also pretend that the Fountain of the Magical Brethren is not a crock, and that somewhere out there, there is a self-respecting Centaur or Goblin who would actually act like a love sick puppy towards some smarmy git and that vapid wench on his arm. This is in no way nonsensical, of course.

32. Fifteen year old performing magic in front of a squib and a muggle who already knows about magic, should be tried by a full court even without justifiable reason. No one should question THIS either.

33. Just generally don't question anything in fact.

34. Nepotism is your friend… Or at least it is if you come from an old Wizarding family and have truckloads of gold, ready and willing to be donated at the drop of a hat. Otherwise you're pretty much doomed.

35. Losing a quill while on the job is utterly reproachable.

36. Losing Bertha Jorkins however…

37. Should a well-respected Ministry official's son turn out to be a Death Eater, be 'horrified' and 'aghast' at the entire affair. The fact that the man in question is astoundingly overzealous and spends all day, every day, away from his home, ruthlessly hunting down law-breakers should in no way be an indication of a slightly malfunctioning home-life, nor a less than empathic nature. If the Ministry official in question is also more than willing to throw his only son into Azkaban and throw away the key, AND ceaselessly subject his only son to an Unforgivable curse, says nothing about the sort of genes getting passed down in that family.

38. If you hire a former Quidditch player and obsessive gambler as the head of the Department of Games and Sports, and put him in charge of the Quidditch World cup AND Triwizard Tournament you should be shocked and astounded when he (you guessed it) gambles. Quite the curveball that one, I'm sure.

39. Have an actual profession called "Unspeakable". This won't make anyone curious at all.

40. People who jump to conclusions are not respected at the Ministry of Magic. People who take a flying leap to conclusions, however, will rise swiftly through the ranks.

41. As a rule, you may only hire spokespersons who are less reassuring than a chain-link fence round a den of rabid coyotes. If you come across a spokesperson who is capable of offering actual comfort to the enquiring masses, terminate them immediately.

42. There have not been enough innuendo-laced statements about the employees of the "Beast Division" written on the bathroom walls, and there never will be.

43. "Muggle-lovers" won't get far in the Ministry, lets make that clear. Bigoted idiots, if they are subtle about their prejudice, will get as far as they like. Overtly sectarian or parochial individuals well be given menial jobs, such as Executioner in the Committee for the Disposal of Dangerous Creatures (not that this is a pointed comment or anything).

44. Handing out an Order of Merlin may seem a daunting task, but fear not as they may be passed around fairly indiscriminately. For example, you may give an Order of Merlin First Class as a token of your gratitude after a large donation has been made to the Ministry. You may give an Order of Merlin Third Class to any smarmy git with a lot of hair gel who claims to have performed remarkable tasks (and then written books about them, of course). And last but not least, you may freely give out an Order of Merlin when some moron goes on a suicide mission instead of leaving it the professionals.

This last one isn't such a disregard of talent as it may seem, since the Wizard in question faked his own death, blew up a street, got his "best friend" locked up and fooled you all for hitting on thirteen years, but one would assume you are not actively rewarding this behaviour and so bestowed the medal in the belief that it was just the suicide mission thing.

45. No Minister for Magic may look unremarkable. Looking like a lion counts as remarkable, so fear not. If approaching blandness in their appearance, a Minister for Magic may compensate by wearing a lurid green hat.

46. If you have an employee whom everyone detests and fantasises about throttling, you should have no qualms about sending her to a school with a spiffy new title and giving her free reign.

47. When that employee is attacked by centaurs, and run off the premises by an angry mob (and a poltergeist with a walking stick) do not ask any questions before taking her back.

48. If that employee is also known to have set Dementors after a teenage boy and his muggle cousin, and is known to have tortured several teens in her 'detention' sessions, the ALL THE BETTER!

49. One more reminder for visitors to wear their nametag at all times, and for no Ministry of Magic personnel to ask questions.

50. Do all this for ten hours a day, every day until retirement and try to make sure your head doesn't explode in the mean time.