Pyramids of Giza.

Sheaves of papers, minarets of memos, leaning towers of files and huge piles of product catalogues make up a cluttered office desk. It adds importance to your repute in the office. People start thinking you work a lot and if you add a coffee mug to your desk 'decor' and have swollen eyes, people take their hats off to 'the man who shoulders the responsibility of the world'.

But cluttered desks are actually a nuisance to others.

You approach your boss and ask him for some important papers and he points to a small 'pyramid' on his desk and says, "Its somewhere there.You'll just need to search a bit." That 'searching a bit' is equivalent to searching for a needle in the haystack. You approach the misorganized 'tomb of khufu' and slowly as you come nearer you marvel at its precise balance, the haphazard, yet perfectly sound structure and, long gone, is your faith in the laws of gravity !!! You put your hand on what could be an engineering marvel and it comes crashing down and your boss yells...."Lousy careless bugger.....Be a bit more careful will you?"

You eat the words....after all, he is your boss....and he has so carefully 'constructed' the genius creation you just destroyed !!

Ironic to your situation, the creator of the 'tomb of khufu' is able to find the paper as well as remove it from the pile without disturbing the earlier arrangement. This makes you wonder whether you have a set of the worlds most careless pair of hands or your boss is a goddamn lucky bastard that he removed the papers without disturbing any other damn paper.

Cluttered desks are good when it comes to giving excuses. "Oh, its better you take a copy of the memo from xyz. There is no way we'll find it in this mess" or

"Hey, dont disturb me right now, see how busy I am, all this paperwork and nobody files these papers."

If someone of this sort tells me that he's going on leave and that I'll find all the relevant papers on his desk........I'll be off on leave as well.