You might think that these little critters (cute, aren’t they?) are egg cups. Well yes of course they are, but they’re more than that. They represent that hideous, perfidious, insidious phenomenon – Infrastructure Creep.

Perhaps I should explain*. We have stuff. We have stuff in Oxford, in France, in storage. We have stuff being lovingly cared for by family and friends. We have furniture and books and clothes and crockery and… you get the picture. So when we came to Malaysia we rented a furnished flat. It has beds and furniture and a set of cutlery for 6 and some glasses and six bowls and six plates and six saucers and five cups (previous tenant broke one). It has pictures on the walls, we even like some of them. It has two cushions. And we plan to stay for a couple of years, not set up a permanent home. So we agreed to keep infrastructure purchases to a minimum.

Which is where the egg cups come in. Along with our 6-of-everything we had an egg cup. One egg cup. There are two of us. Souls were searched, scenarios were developed, and yes. We needed another egg cup. So we bought one. But it was cute. So I bought two. It’s the beginning of a slippery slope. It starts with a spare egg cup, and ends…. where?

Since our momentous purchase, the pace of Infrastructure Creep has accelerated. The office chair collapsed – we ordered a new one. I saw some lovely towels that we don’t need – I bought them. I’m eyeing up a picture for that empty hook on the wall. I’ve seen a… and wouldn’t that just look nice…we really need a…

Which brings us back to egg cups. Are three enough? especially when one doesn’t match…

*no, not eggsplain. This is a serious blog post. Not a yolk sorry joke.