Hey Simon, do you fancy replacing Lesley Keating as one of our columnists?’ said a member of the features team. ‘It’s really easy. Just write 500 or so words on three topics each week. We’ll put it online as well as in The News so that means lots of people can merrily criticise you each week for having views that disagree with theirs. If you’re lucky, someone might even take a real dislike to you.’