You don't check to see if your match succeeded, and just let the script run into an invalid redirect or possibly the first of your dies.

Ah, that's why I said...

Obviously it wouldn't be great to use for production, but you get the idea.

I didn't include an error routine just for simplicity sake, though it may have been a good idea to.

Also, when you reopen the counter file for writing, you lose the lock.

Thanks for the point there.

Joshua