A small inconsistency in syntax?

[Michael Abbott]

"Steve Holden" <sholden at holdenweb.com> wrote in
news:x3WB7.28536$Nx2.553375 at atlpnn01.usenetserver.com: 

> "Michael Abbott" <michael at rcp.co.uk> wrote in message
> news:Xns91459674D7271michaelrcpcouk at 194.238.50.13...
>
> Oh, no it isn't. The best parallel I can think of is writing
> 
>>>> 2 = 34
> Traceback (SyntaxError: can't assign to literal
> 
> although in your case you are trying to assign to a constructor rather
> than a literal

Hmm.  Ok, I think I'll buy that.  Yes, I guess I might expect to get a run-
time whinge about mismatching values instead, but I think I'm getting silly 
now.

>>     time, status, _ = myobject.read()
>>
> 
> Or, if you really don't want to do that, how about
> 
>     time, status = myobject.read()[:2]

No, I think I prefer my original!  Ta.