Last week the Federal Reserve announced the biggest cut in overnight lending rates in more than two decades. Congress, not to be outdone, is slapping together a massive deficit spending package aimed at giving the economy an emergency booster shot.

The CIA and the Pentagon didn't want other agencies mucking about in their computer networks; other agencies sought to maintain exclusive relationships with certain industries.

Indeed, al-Qaida, a secret and secretive organization, would be much more immune to Israeli retaliations than is Hamas, a generally pragmatic organization.

Naturally, the helpful Garbage Pail Kids want to assist, so they all steal some sewing machines and begin slapping together nightclubbing dresses for teen whores.

We must trust the richness of children's ideas, the report says, not impose our own. Case studies in the report emphasise exploration, experimentation and "mucking about with things".

The Israeli explanation for this rather casual approach to security is that the facility was so secret, not even the Syrian Army knew about it, hence the lack of defensive measures. Michael acidly suggests, “this reactor was so secretive that nobody in Syria knew about its existence. Only the Israelis knew.”

Employee engagement is one of the biggest issues facing any leading food or non-food retailer. The specific challenges for Mr Schultz were set out in a recent book, Punching In, by Alex Frankel, who worked as a trainee barista in a San Francisco Starbucks outlet in 2005. He recounts a chaotic introduction to the company, with no time to read the extensive spiral binders of training information, and a feeling that the employees were simply "slapping together" an overly expensive beverage, without any of the "romance and theatre" Mr Schultz says is at the heart of its brand.

"Well, one day I was mucking about in the shower, trying to make someone laugh by undermining the point of jokes."

Why are secret societies so secretive? ... it's probably a lot easier to sneak a van full of hookers into a campground than into 30 Rockefeller Center or the Four Seasons.

PJ Harvey just put out a new studio LP, White Chalk, in October, but that's not stopping the chanteuse from slapping together another one for release this year.

Tony has neither a publicist nor reliable cellphone service nor the financial capacity to make his alimony payments to the ex-wife he calls during drunken benders with women who don’t offer fun free. Tony isn’t merely a pig; he is a pig mucking about in a lot of old and dried-out mud.

Giuliani kept to the war drums, but his bad Florida poll numbers have turned that leased campaign smile into his more familiar sneer. His eyes fired up when asked why his hometown New York Times editorial sized him up as a "narrow, obsessively secretive, vindictive man."

The only difference is the tools we use now. Instead of slapping together all the genes of two plants and hoping for the best, we pick the exact gene we want: to give us a desired effect, such as, resistance to poisons spread on weeds.

One day, just before I was due to leave the school, I was mucking about a bit in the classroom and the teacher said, "Get the gloves on."

These often secretive government controlled investment vehicles control well over £1 trillion of assets, giving them vast financial firepower.

There are few of us who can do more than hold up a scrunchy we slapped together in home economics back when Sinbad was on the A-list.

“My husband, Ben, and I were mucking about with the dogs when a mole on my lower back started to bleed and became sore and itchy and then it turned black,” she said.

The cases raise questions about the sources of the family's vast wealth and the elaborate, secretive way in which the couple allegedly moved money around the world.

Would you please let everyone know that wordy, one-page, last-minute electronic transmissions are just not worth sending? What message do these slapped-together messages send -- "This is all I had time for"?

More questions than answers, perhaps. Or perhaps some of us need to get a first life before we start mucking about with a second.

Although Mr. Brown portrayed the secretive Roman Catholic group Opus Dei in a negative light in "The Da Vinci Code," Mr. Elias says he isn't worried. "Freemasonry will survive Dan Brown," he says.

"This is also a first-class club, not just some singles group that was slapped together. I’ve worked very hard on this. It’s an exclusive club for singles who love to play golf."

Stylistically, it was very Top Gear-ish: three middle-aged blokes mucking about, taking the mickey out of each other and stressing roughly every third word of the narration, the verbal equivalent of a wittily raised eyebrow.

Secretive investors to build vast resort near Vinnytsia