ONCE upon a time, there were these two brothers.

The younger was a work-shy layabout whose hobbies included experimenting with recreational drugs, scratching Lotto Instant cards and lying on a sofa watching repeats of Home And Away.

The older was a merchant banker with a six-figure salary, a penthouse flat, a Porsche Boxer and a personal investment portfolio that meant he need never work again.

But his worldly achievements developed a hollow ring when he dropped dead of a heart attack at the age of 28, leaving his entire fortune to his waster of a brother.

This story sounds like modern folklore, I know, but according to a friend of a friend it's all Gospel; it happened in the last couple of months and the small English town where the brothers grew up is now agog, waiting to see what effect his inheritance will have on the waster who's now a millionaire.

Apparently the pair weren't close - industrious brother despaired of his layabout sibling - so will there be even the semblance of mourning?

Will little brother take notice of the health warning associated with big brother's early grave, or will he end up like tabloid bogeyman Michael Carroll, the £9.7 million lottery winner who wore a curfew tag when he collected his winnings, and who has been busy ever since, splashing out on cocaine and quad bikes, the better to terrorise his neighbours in a quiet corner of Norfolk?

You get the sense that his inheritance may not make little brother happy; but there's no doubt that the developments in his life will add to the gaiety of his neighbourhood.

All of us want to be happy, and a lot of us, myself included, think, in the face of overwhelming evidence, that money could get us there quick.

And when we have failed to win the lottery yet again, the prospect of the daily grind is not enhanced by the vision of some ne'er-do-well scooping a life of indolent luxury before our envious eyes.

The least they can do is give us a laugh by ending up miserable.

Maybe the key for we, the envious majority, is to be a bit more modest with our aspirations. Indeed, there's some new theory suggesting that earning more than £25,000 a year will not in itself make you any happier.

Chance of earning £25,000 would be a fine thing, say many; and even those who do take home more than that may be less than convinced by the argument.

It goes like this: earn £25,000 and your worldly needs (food, shelter, healthcare) are covered; what you should be doing with any further income is exchanging cash for experiences, not designer labels, because a Himalayan trek will make you happier than a Rolex.

(This assumes that you do not have kids who will drag you off to Toys R Us and get happy on your extra cash before you make it to the airport!)

I think this theory misses the point. Ask someone what makes them happy, and it's odds-on they'll say something like a sunny afternoon out, a favourite song playing on the radio, an unexpected letter from a friend. Not much about cash, in general.

An unexpected text message can also make you happy - but not always.

A pal of ours, who recently went to Canada in search of life-enhancing experiences, got off the plane to find seven text messages on his phone.

His heart swelled with pride to think how his family must be missing him; but when he called the messages up, one by one, this Middlesbrough fan slowly discovered that his team had just had the trouncing of a lifetime.

Updated: 09:44 Wednesday, February 01, 2006