Since tomorrow is a day off …

Nov. 10, 1976:

Writing with Terry — some hopeful starts, but nothing great as yet, the most promising being a piece Terry has begun about the Three Wise Men, confused over which star they’re following and being constantly mistaken for the wrong sort of astrologers and having to tell people about their star sign. In the classic Python mould of the humour of frustration; irritation at constantly being diverted by trivia.

Nov. 10, 1978:

John dropped in for breakfast. We looked through Three Wise Men together . . . The roof of the stable drips occasionally as a welcome reminder that it could have been raining on Jesus’ birthday.

The costumes are excruciatingly hard to bear. My headdress is like having a sixty-pound haversack on one’s skull, and both Graham and I have immense trouble with long, swirling trains — as we make an impressive exit, Graham’s train catches on the door, rips down the middle and pulls the door off its hinges.

— Michael Palin, Diaries 1969 – 1979: The Python Years