Just as a thought from someone who has an uncle a similar age to herself... he's so bloody annoying now! He was so cool when I was younger, we'd go to the pictures together as we like the same films, he'd threaten my boyfriends (my Dad never got into that role with me), he was a right laugh. Now he is treated more like my mum's child than me, his children are as important as DS to her (more so, I feel, as she sees them more), my mother has even said that should she win the lottery she'd split half of it three ways, part to me, part to my sister, part to him! Not upset about that so much, but she and my dad have other siblings and the excrement could hit the fan here.

I am not saying she should put her children above her siblings and never would, but it does grate that if I need her and he needs her she always goes to him first. Well, my sister, then him. Even now, if I need her for just a five minute talk "can't help, *brother* and his family are coming round in three hours and I want to cook lunch for them."

But I'm a bitter and twisted person.