Every now and then I think up a new blog gimmick, then I forget it after a few days. My latest wheeze is to tell you every day what I was doing at 16.00 local time. Why on earth you should care I don’t know, but it will give a series of arbitrary snapshots, and at least at 16.00 I am likely to be reasonably respectable.

At 16.00 today I was at the desk in my Accra bedroom, reading The Extermination of A British Army by Terence Blackburn, taking notes from it, and listening to Death and Transfiguration by Richard Strauss.

I am not in general fond of violence, but very seldom get het up about political violence against things. As a young man I contributed my small bit to rather a lot of violence done to Torness nuclear power station in the early stages of its construction. But I really do not approve of hurting policemen, or of hijacking peaceful demonstrations and spoiling their effect for those who worked hard in organising them.

If those attacking shops yesterday want to attack a bank headquarters in the City, organising it themselves, using surprise to minimise opposition and violence, doing what damage they can until it reaches the stage where someone might get hurt, then qucikly getting out, good luck to them. But there is no point at all to attacking bank retail branches, and the influential have not frequented the Ritz for half a century. They much prefer the Wolseley just across St James, but the rioters seem to have walked right past it and not given it much attention. They need a social adviser.