"the junior faculty"
"a lowly corporal"
"petty officialdom"
"a subordinate functionary"

"a fiddling sum of money"
"a footling gesture"
"our worries are lilliputian compared with those of countries that are at war"
"a little (or small) matter"
"a dispute over niggling details"
"limited to petty enterprises"
"piffling efforts"
"giving a police officer a free meal may be against the law, but it seems to be a picayune infraction"

"petty little comments"
"disgusted with their small-minded pettiness"