small talk with a bureaucrat about a process

your time would be better spent talking to a brick wall, or slamming your head against it.

no matter how charming the dialogue, how cordial the relationship, how good your reason or excuse may be, you will never ever budge them an inch on any topic that’s been codified into a process. these people are mechanical and rules to them are ordained by a higher power — as long as it’s written somewhere and issued a document number never expect the outcome to change.