M&D Spoiler (sorta) -- mixing idioms

[Jeremy Osner]

Last night after 5 days straight of M&D, I was rereading the
introduction of Slow Learner to give my brain a break from the 18-th
century diction... I happened to notice his comment about what a
liberating notion it had been in the late fifties to think that he could
mix two English idioms together freely.

So that led me to think, a reason to write M&D in archaic diction-- Tom
wanted to have more fun with mixing idioms? After all some of the
funniest bits I've noticed so far (I'm only on p. 200) involve
anachronism between the diction and the topic of discussion -- for
instance the talking dog discussion about koans or the mention of
Southern California.

Any thoughts on this? Also, has anyone else been bothered by overuse of
the phrase "sort of thing"?

Jeremy