My brother...

... is kind of weird. If you'd told me 10 years ago that one day I'd think he was weirder than me, I wouldn't have believed you.

Of course now I'm a lot more conventional than I was. And he's essentially now occupying my old niche of "weirdo of the family".

He's 22. Lives in Derby studying psychology and making music and abusing various substances. He's a vegetarian and a pagan and an insomniac and pretty much a communist (although he'd deny the communism because he's probably got a different name for it). Plus he has dreadlocks and piercings and generally looks like a hippy. His screen name is Spudfairy. No need to ask why, because I'd tell you.

Worryingly we are very similar in our liberal attitudes, and awareness that we both need more out of life than most people, our sense of humour, our sense of not being accepted into general society (which neither of us sees as necessarily a bad thing), our desire to make the world around us a better place. We're both into psychology and creating music and reading.

We disagree on religion, as I'm an atheist. I'm much more cautious about such things as drug-taking (haven't done anything other than very occasional grass since I was a teenager), he's much more of a worrier. I care about damage to the environment and extinction of animals and destruction of ecosystems, he cares about exploitation of people. I'm not a fan of bitter, he doesn't like white wine. He winds my parents up, I calm them down. He phones me for advice, I give advice. He's considered cool in his circle of friends, I'm the old-but-nice one who can cook and has nerdy hobbies like birdwatching and roleplaying and takes care of hedgehogs. I'm a scientist with creative tendencies, he's an artist with analytical tendencies. My eyes are blue, his are brown.

Despite all that, there's no doubting that we're related - everyone comments that although we don't look much alike you can tell we're brother and sister.

I'm talking about my brother because I've just watched all of his YouTube video blogs, finally. I laughed a lot. He told me months ago that he plans to become a minor internet celebrity, as his blogging persona. Have a look, seriously. You'll either think they're really funny, or not funny at all - I have to just note that he isn't really like that!





And while I'm here I'll pimp his music too. His band Turning Hollow is on MySpace, and his new collaboration with our mutual friend "Mystic" Mike is on there too.

So yeah. My brother. He rocks. More than me.