Order of the Golden Sprout The New Robert Rankin Fan Club

Oh come on! The gay nineties are the eighteen nineties!

You've convinced me
Actually it could be far worse - you're not doing a George Lucas and making John touch Norman AFTER Jim fires the soda syphon or something similar.
 

PS - I should have fact checked - they are indeed the 1890's http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gay_Nineties
How irritating! hehe

Of course, social history was never a strong suit for me

They didn't cover the gay scene of late 1800's Chicago in history at school - they probably need to mix things up a little.

The temptation to slip in present day references into 1980's books is tempting. Too tempting to resist in fact. So you will find a few.

That sounds like a good easter egg hunt challange

I remember a TV series called Chelmsford 123 (set in Chelmsford in the year 123 ) in which a character called Blag once or twice during the series said something completely out of time. My favourite being "Ere - did anyone see Panorama last night?" - then complaining that his head felt funny. The only other time it happened I think he described building a steam engine

Never heard of that but it sounds interesting.
Lots of clips here:
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Chelmsford+123&oq=Chelmsford+123&aq=f&aqi=g5&aql=&gs_nf=1&gs_l=youtube.12..0l5.4828.4828.0.10141.1.1.0.0.0.0.500.500.5-1.1.0.
Looks quite good:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chelmsford_123
 
DVD £9.99:
http://www.find-dvd.co.uk/dvd/Chelmsford-123-The-Complete-Series-One-and-Two/1107908.htm

They're all available to stream on 4OD
http://www.channel4.com/programmes/chelmsford-123/4od