Dave's Law Of System Administration

Law

There's always an easier way.

Corollary

Things frequently get done sooner if you just do them the hard way rather than continuing to seek an easier way.

(Also known as the Projects Manager's Observation: sometimes you just have to shoot the engineers and put the damn thing into production.)

Observation

The probability that someone will ask you why you didn't use the easier way, which will seem trivially obvious in hindsight, is inversely proportional to the amount of work remaining in the task.