Write or wrong, I’m at a milestone measured in column inches

I’M looking for a little indulgence this week because I’m celebrating an anniversary that, up to now, no one in the world knows about but me.

This is my 400th column for the Irish Examiner (and lest anyone get the wrong idea, dear editor, I’m ready, willing and able to do 400 more).

It’s because I save them on the computer that I know it. Four hundred columns, all neatly typed, all emailed down to the Irish Examiner late on Sunday night (or sometimes, if a story is still breaking, up to the middle of Monday afternoon), all exactly 1,200 words long. I’m a bit peculiar about that. The editor is free to do with the column what he wishes because my instincts aren’t proprietorial, and actually every bit of editing I’ve seen over the years is an improvement, but he’ll always get 1,200 words to play with, not 1,199 or 1,201. It adds up to a total of just under half-a-million words, believe it or not.