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Back to the hotel – drenched. In T Gilliam’s room we launched into our first interview – with a guy called Howard Kissel from Women’s Wear Daily. He looked just like Tiny Tim, he was easy to talk to, had a good sense of humour, and asked intelligent questions.

We walk round the corner to the Russian Tea Room. Clearly a place to be seen. Full of chic, sophisticated New Yorkers, looking over their shoulders all the time to spot the celebrities. Caroline Kennedy, daughter of JFK, was at the table next to ours. Funny that on our first day in NY in ’72 Terry and I passed Ted Kennedy in the street. Maybe they just walk around all the time.

TJ flaked out, but I was so high on New York that, despite being over-full of blinis and red wine, I walked around a bit with Michael Winship of PBS. An interesting guy, he had been a member of the Washington press corps during Watergate. He said the night Nixon resigned there was a numb feeling of total paralysis, then, as the helicopter flew off from the White House lawn, a huge burst of festivities broke out. ‘The King is Dead’, ‘Long live the King’ atmosphere, he says, was incredible.

Well, this extraordinary day ended about 12.00 (4.00 a.m. British time). G Chapman, who always seems to wander into my life at the end of the day, appeared in the hotel corridor. He was shaking his head in disbelief and seemed anxious to tell me a story of his visit to the City Baths.

I sank into a fitful sleep. Make a mental note not to eat or drink ever again.

Sunday, March 9th, New York

We wandered down with our photographer towards the Park Plaza Hotel. He took a few shots of the four of us standing in front of the ponies and traps which do trips round Central Park. After only about 20 seconds of shots, one of the men sourly grunted about us losing him custom (there was no-one for miles anyway) and moved his horse to the other side of the street. Then this generous spirit of animosity was carried on by another horse owner, a young long haired boy, who, somewhat to our amazement, for we had hardly been there for a minute, began to lecture us on the American way of life in general, and paying modelling fees to horse owners on Central Park in particular.

But the final straw, which caused GC and I to laugh all the way to the Plaza Hotel, was when one of the horses took a sudden and very violent lunge at Terry J. The wonderful aggrieved indignation in Terry’s voice I’ll remember for ever.

‘He’s bitten a lump out of my coat!’

Sure enough there was a chunk of fur missing from the sleeve of Terry’s brand new big, brown shaggy coat.

Over to Channel 13, which is in a small, cramped, but friendly basement a couple of blocks from the UN and on the edge of the East River. In the studio is a small presentation area, in which sits Gene Shalit, a genial Harpo-Marx sort of character. Behind Gene are some thirty or forty people at desks with telephones. Throughout this evening and the next 11 evenings, the programmes of Channel 13 (which include English imports like Upstairs Downstairs and The Ascent of Man) are interspersed with jolly sales pitches from Gene in which he asks the audience to phone up and pledge money – five, ten dollars, whatever – to keep this non-commercial station going.

Gene Shalit’s children are there (his daughter, who can’t have been more than fifteen, leaned conspiratorially towards me and whispered softly, ‘You know, Python and grass go very well together’), also a few fans (unattractive but keen) and we are all squashed in a small viewing/reception room. Periodically during the five hours we appear with Shalit – at one time answering phones, at another being interviewed.

The general chaotic business of the evening sorts itself out by around 12.00. Two Python shows have gone out on Channel 13 that evening, plus at least half an hour’s screen time of ourselves. We later heard that the viewing figures for tonight were the highest Channel 13 ever had.

At the end of the evening, on air, we make a very committed