DAMN, that was good.

Tonight's season finale of "Mad Men" was one of those blessing / curse episodes: it took threads from throughout the season, tied them together into a happy ending of cheer-worthy proportions, but just as you start to think, "Oh, man, I can't wait to see what happens next," you remember that you're watching the season finale and that your wait is going to last for the better part of a year.

When we first see Don, he's a goddamned mess. He looks like crap, he's been kicked out of his own bed, and even worse, his alarm didn't go off, leading him to show up late for a meeting with Conrad Hilton. Not exactly the best start to a day, and it only gets worse: Connie drops the bombshell that McCann-Erickson is buying Putnam, Powell & Lowe, and since PPL owns Sterling-Cooper...well, so much for the Draper / Hilton partnership. Given his already rough morning, it's no surprise that Don quickly descends into mouthing off to Connie about his treatment, leading Hilton to snap back with the suggestion that Don's being a bit of a whiner. In the end, the two shake hands and depart as...not exactly friends, but still on some semblance of friendliness, at least from a business standpoint.

It's after this encounter, though, that the ball really starts rolling, and, man, there are some points where you feel like the ball in question is the boulder that chased Indiana Jones in "Raiders of the Lost Ark." Seriously, this was about as fast-moving an episode of "Mad Men" as I can ever remember. After we have a quick flashback to Don's childhood, wherein we see that he has some personal experience to abrupt business transitions, Mr. Draper blows into Mr. Cooper's office and drops on him the bombshell that he's learned from Hilton. The result, surprisingly enough, is little more than a shrug. ("It makes sense," says Bert. "All that short-term thinking.") When Cooper falls back on his "we've got a contract" mentality, Don lashes back and suggests that they try and buy Sterling-Cooper back from the Brits, making for an absolutely fantastic back-and-forth between the two of them, delivered with impeccable timing by Jon Hamm and Robert Morse. The buyback isn't such a bad idea, but, of course, it involves Don and Roger Sterling having to start speaking again, which would seem to lower the odds considerably...and, yet, it doesn't. Instead, it leads to a reconciliation between the two of them, though not before Morse and John Slattery get their chance to do some verbal sparring, with Cooper offering his "Join or Die" speech and Sterling openly mocking his tactics. Even after returning to speaking terms with Roger, however, Don still can't catch a break, returning home only to get the word from Betty that she's moving forward with her plans to divorce him.

The Trio of Power - that's what I've decided to start calling Don, Roger, and Bert - soon reconvene and invite Lane Pryce in for a cup of tea, springing it on him that they know all about the situation with PPL and Sterling-Cooper. He tells them they're slightly misinformed. Turns out that he's slightly misinformed, once again getting the shaft from the company to which we've consistently seen him giving his all. This time they've gone too far, however, and he's not afraid to let them know it. I gotta tell ya, I almost cheered when Lane began working out specifics with the Trio of Power about a possible partnership. This scene was even more enthralling than the ones which had preceded it, with the Trio more than willing to acknowledge Lane's worth to them. And as soon as the quartet decided on their new plan of attack - to let Lane fire them and immediately begin working a back-door plan to start their own brand new agency - the tone of the episode officially turned into something not terribly far removed from "Ocean's 11," with a "we're getting the band back together" vibe.

But what do you do when not everybody in the band wants to get back together?

It was only inevitable that we'd get a showdown between Don and Peggy when he invited her to join up with his new endeavor, especially since he couldn't even be bothered to ask her properly, and given her increased confidence after her time spent with Duck Phillips, I knew she'd view this as the perfect time to cut and run. What I didn't expect, however, was the heartfelt scene when Don visited her apartment, apologized for spending all of this time believing that she was an extension of himself, and basically saying that either she needs to come along and join the gang or he's going to annoy her into submission by spending the rest of his life trying to convince her to join him. How you do turn down an offer like that? Answer: you don't.

At first, it looks like the visit to Pete's place is going to end as awkwardly as Don's first meeting with Peggy, given how completely pissed off he is about the way he's been treated by the firm during his battle with Ken. Like Peggy, he's riding high on the knowledge that there are others out there who are interested in his talents, but he's completely shut down by Don's forthright conversation. Pete wouldn't be Pete if he didn't try to play the big shot, but this scene felt arguably as realistic as anything this season, the way he was flitting back and forth between wanting to be the tough guy and wanted a shot to play with the guys whose feet he's been worshiping at for these past three seasons. (I laughed out loud when the eavesdropping Trudy all but shrieked from the other room in an attempt to get Pete's attention.) When I saw Roger smirk at the incredible ballsiness of Pete's actions, though, I knew he'd sealed the deal for himself.

But let's bounce back to Betty for a moment, who goes through with her threat to visit a divorce attorney...and one recommended by Henry, no less. (I loved the lawyer's harrumphing about the inappropriateness of the situation, or at least how he perceived it.) So, now, the impression I got from that conversation was that Betty was going to take his advice and go live in Reno for six months, but what's up with Henry suggesting that she not bother with alimony? Surely she's earned the right to take some of Don's money after all she's had to deal with over the years. Once Roger spilled the beans on the Betty / Henry relationship, however, I wondered for a split second if she was going to survive to see any alimony, anyway. Man, he was pissed...not that he had even the slightest leg to stand on, given the countless times he's cheated on her over the years. Soon, we have to endure the moment that every parent dreads and every child from a broken home relives for the rest of their lives: the "Daddy's not going to be living with us anymore" speech. It had to be done, of course, but when you've seen one of these speeches, you've seen them all.

Back to Sterling-Cooper. From here, it was non-stop excitement until the final credits rolled. Harry is brought into the new fold, with his skepticism over the situation resulting in one of the funniest exchanges of the night.

Harry: Are you kidding me?
Roger: Yes. Yes, we are. Happy birthday.

Watching the gang get all their ducks in a row for their departure was fun. Though nothing was more wonderful than the sight of Joan walking back through the door and into our lives once more, Roger's request for Peggy to get him coffee came pretty close, and the aftereffects within the office were even better.

If Ken's annoyance over Pete's attempts to swipe away clients brought a smile to your face, then Paul Kinsey's horrified expression at the realization that he'd been left behind was worth a full-fledged laugh. That's what the pompous blowhard gets!

Alison Brie is so cute, and her delivery was absolutely perfect when she came into the new, presumably-temporary offices of The Ad Men Formerly Known As Sterling-Cooper and said, "Isn't this exciting?" It is exciting: it offers up a whole new world for "Mad Men" whenever Matthew Weiner deigns to provide us with the show's 4th season. And with Don saying to Betty, "I'm not going to fight you, I hope you get what you always wanted," it's fair to say that, even though his marriage may be over, he's found some semblance of bliss. Indeed, Season 3 of "Mad Men" ends with, as my wife described it, Don Draper looking as happy as she's ever seen him, surveying the terrain of his new kingdom. I say he's imagining what the future will hold for him...which, not coincidentally, is exactly what most of us are doing.

It may be a long damned wait until Season 4 gets here, but, damn, you can't say that Mr. Weiner didn't give us one hell of a wrap-up to Season 3.

There would seem to be no more appropriate way to end the final blog of the season than with the same song that played over the closing credits: "Shahdaroba," by Roy Orbison. I've got to admit: I'd never heard this song before tonight. But with that said, count on it blowing up on the iTunes charts tonight. (Hell, *I* just downloaded it...)

In the words of Layne Pryce, "Happy Christmas!" See you next year!

It's impossible to write about the season's penultimate episode of "Mad Men" without immediately acknowledging the elephant in the room: the JFK assassination. As grim as it sounds, it's an event we've been waiting for since the second episode of this season. You may or may not remember, but there was a shot in Episode 3.2 which pointedly focused on Margaret Sterling's wedding invitation, of which I wrote at the time, "I’m sure those who know their ’60s dates better than I do offered a sad nod when they saw the date of Roger’s daughter’s wedding, but I had to look it up. Given that the camera pointedly held on the invitation, I figured, 'Okay, clearly, this is an important date,' and I was right. Well, the actual wedding day isn’t necessarily important, but the day before certainly will be."

And so it was, though it was already starting off pretty important for a few folks at Sterling-Cooper even before things went dramatically downhill in Dallas.

Roger's daughter is battling back against her new stepmother, making ridiculous claims about how Jane's gotten her so wound up that she no longer wants to get married. This sets Mona, a.k.a. the former Mrs. Sterling, into a rant during which she comes across as about as pleasant a mother as Betty Draper, but it's clear that, once upon a time, she and Roger really were a match made in Heaven. Roger, meanwhile, has his own problems, and in the midst of his annoyance with Jane's attempts to forge a relationship with Margaret, she locks herself in the bathroom. She tells him to go away. He snaps back, "Or what? You'll commit suicide?" That's dark, Roger, but somehow it's still funny...well, y'know, unless that's what she actually did.

We got a brief reappearance of Peggy's roommate, who seemed to mostly show up for purposes of disparaging the relationship between Peggy and Duck Phillips. Later, she gets completely flustered (and we get a big laugh) when Duck invites her off for a mid-day rendezvous and, when she attempts to slip out surreptitiously, Paul unabashedly calls her out by saying, "I know a nooner when I hear one." Awesome.

Aw, look at poor little Pete, asleep on the couch. Rustled awake by his assistant, his first instinct is to criticize the hot chocolate she's brought him. That's our Pete! It's ice cold in the office for some reason (later, Don complaints that it's too hot, leading me to believe that there's some intended temperature-related metaphor going on in the background), and it only gets colder when Lane Pryce calls him into his office to give him some "rather disappointing news": Ken is being made senior VP in charge account services, while Pete will be head of account management. Pete takes in the information with as much stride as he can manage, though you get the impression that he could well go "American Psycho" at any given moment. He bails out of the office and heads home, where a surprised Trudy immediately begins to play Ellery Queen and work her way through Pete's assurances that he's been fired before confirming that he's just being typically melodramatic. A return to the office leads him into a conversation with Harry, but when Harry reaches over to turn down the volume on the TV on his desk so that they can chat in earnest, a familiar CBS News graphic pops onto the screen...well, familiar to someone who's watched "JFK" as many times as I have, anyway.

This was an episode where the tension level was racked up a little bit higher for those who are well versed in the television coverage of JFK's assassination and recognized what was unfolding when. Example: when Duck was watching TV but unplugged the set when he heard Peggy's knock on the door, it was hard for me to keep from jumping out of my seat, knowing full well what was going to be unfolding in mere minutes.

From this point on, it appears that the episode is going to be less about the lives of our usual cast of characters and more about how they and the rest of the nation are going to be dealing with the emotional repercussions of the fall of Camelot. And so it is, at least to a certain extent: not only does Sterling-Cooper comes to a complete standstill, but I can only presume that dogs and cats are living together, given that we also see the probable Armageddon sign of Betty Draper accepting a sympathetic hug from Sally. Everyone's utterly taken aback by the events...yes, even Duck and Peggy, once they finally get around to plugging the TV back in. I had to laugh...if humorlessly one...at Trudy questioning whether Pete had been drinking or not, leading Pete to snap back, "The whole country's drinking!" Watching the Draper kids being completely enthralled at the events unfolding on their TV set, I was immediately reminded of my own experience - not quite as bad, but the closest thing I have from my actual childhood - of Ronald Reagan being shot when I was 10 years old. I didn't understand, I couldn't wrap my head around what I was seeing, but I'll be damned if I could take my eyes off the set.

Margaret's nuptials continued on unabated, albeit without a wait staff or even a wedding cake, but even though the gang manages to make it to the festivities, that doesn't mean that half of them...including Jane...don't end up finding their way into the kitchen to watch a TV and see how things are progressing in the JFK situation. When Sterling dragged them out so that they could witness him give his toast, I once again found myself flashing back to what I knew would be happening, thinking, "No, don't leave yet! You're going to miss Oswald getting shot!"

I loved the Betty said "of course" under her breath when Henry Francis walked in the door, but I must admit that I absolutely did not expect the storyline of the Drapers to finish up the way it did. With the way Don stepped up and was helping with the baby at the beginning of the episode and his assurances to Betty while they were dancing that "everything's going to be fine," I was fool enough to believe that this was going to be a turning point for them as a couple. It never occurred to me that the show's own version of JFK and Jackie would come crashing down at long last. In the end, Don was left completely blindsided by Betty's admission that their marriage was over...not that he should've been, really, but it's clear that he was.

Next week's the big season finale, and I no longer have any idea what to expect...well, except that, with the unraveling relationship between Roger and Jane and his regular communications with Joan, I expect to see the former Ms. Holloway feature heavily. Beyond that, it's anyone's guess. Now that's good TV.

First things first: my thanks to Bob Westal for ably filling my shoes last week while I was in the UK. Alas, I was so busy covering the press junket for "Pirate Radio" that I wasn't able to hunt down the home office of Putnam, Powell, and Lowe. Oh, well, maybe next time...

Betty is packing her bags when the episode begins. Will it prove to be prophetic...? We'll see, but it certainly doesn't seem to bode well that A) she and the kids are heading off for a week at her dad's old place, and B) her last moments with Don involve him...well, not so much lying to her face about his stash o' cash as unabashedly avoiding giving an answer when she asks if he has any money lying around. But, even so, you can tell she's still damned well pissed at him, and given all of the confusing information that she's found out about him through the contents of the drawer, you can't blame her.

We meet Annabelle Mathis, heiress to a fortune in dog food as a result of her husband's unfortunately demise at the age of 51...and, boy, the look Roger cut to Don when he was lighting up just as Annabelle was revealing that her husband had died of lung cancer was priceless. Don's given the opportunity to take a shot at the campaign (apparently, Sterling-Cooper used to have their business, but, per Bert Cooper, "Her father was a son of a bitch"), just so long as he follows two cardinal rules: don't change the recipe and don't change the name. What's the connection between Roger and Annabelle? Well, there was clearly a relationship of some sort back in the day. At first, it sounded like an extra-martial affair, since she asked him if he's still married, but it's later revealed that their coupling was quite some time in the past...not that either one of them has forgotten it. It's to Roger's credit that, despite the amount of alcohol in his system, he still doesn't take advantage of the opportunity for post-dinner entertainment that Annabelle offers him.

Speaking of Roger's extra-marital affairs, Joan is trying to help her husband prepare for job interviews, and in the process, she learns that his father had a nervous breakdown. Somehow, that stands to reason. The next day, she decides to call Roger and, although she won't ask him for her old job back, she's not above asking him for assistance in finding a new gig. The two of them have a nice, flirtatious conversation that harks back to earlier seasons, making for one of the most pleasant scenes of the episode, and although it doesn't entirely pay off for Joan yet, Roger does indeed start making calls on her behalf. Things don't go nearly as well for Dr. Greg, however, who promptly does an emotional bellyflop during his interview, then comes home and takes his annoyance out on his wife. She, however, responds in turn, clocking him over the head with a vase and leaving him to pick up the resulting broken glass by his damned self. "Oh, shit," indeed. You go, Joan. But by episode's end, we're left wondering if maybe she gave him a concussion, as he returns home to tell her that he's joined the Army. Just the mention of Vietnam and the throwaway line when he references it, saying, "If that's still going on..." is a sure sign that he'll be going over there and probably never coming back.

The dog food test for Calcott Farms goes so horribly bad, with the participants immediately recognizing the name, that Don orders Peggy to turn it off, leading to one of the funniest lines in the episode: "I can't turn it off. It's actually happening!" And then...

Oh, but you don't want to hear any more about this stuff, do you? Let's get to the real meat and potatoes of the episode: Don and Betty.

As is only to be expected, Don is back in the arms of Sally's teacher the second Betty and the kids are out of town, but what he doesn't know is that Betty, in addition to battling with her brother over their dad's house, is also discussing with her attorney what she's learned about Don and trying to figure out what her options are. Unfortunately, he doesn't offer her much in the way of encouragement, basically just telling her that maybe she'd be better off trying to work things out.

As such, she and the kids head home early, and Don gets the living hell shocked out of him when he walks in the door to find them waiting for him. "I, uh, need to go back out to the car. I left my hat." Nice try, Don. But, of course, the look of horror on his face at that moment was nothing compared to his reaction when she demanded that he opened the drawer of the desk in his office.

The subsequent talk between Betty and Don was one of those scenes where...well, first of all, no matter what he's done before or since this in the season, it was enough by itself to earn Jon Hamm an Emmy nod. Don did a pretty good job of laying it all on the line for Betty...moreso, I think, than many of us might've expected. But, y'know, he's been holding this stuff in for so long and never known how to discuss it with him wife, and now he doesn't have any choice. It's a case where he doesn't know how she's going to react and it doesn't even really matter: it's just a chance to finally clear his conscience. And by episode's end, he once again finds himself in a position where he's decided that, dammit, he's going to get back on the straight and narrow and commit to his marriage, kicking Sally's teacher to the curb.

Will it last...? Given his history, there's no reason to think so, yet this is the biggest secret of Don's life, and he's finally opened up to Betty about it. It could prove to be a real game-changer.

Believe it or not, Will Harris has made a quick jump across the pond to the UK on a super secret mission of entertainment reportage this week. No word if he’ll be in communications with the 21^st century descendants of Saint John Powell, Lane Pryce, and the rest of Sterling Cooper’s British overlords. As a result, however, I’m allowed one more whack at this whole “Mad Men” recap thing this week.

So...Don’s lies are becoming more transparent than ever. He arrives for dinner one night and is dutifully given his drink by Betty. She asks him if he’ll be sleeping at home and the answer is no. More work he says. Betty simply accepts that he commuted all the way from Manhattan to Connecticut, only to return to the office later on. This is apparently a regular thing these days.

Soon Don is in bed with the alluring Suzanne Farrell, lest we forget, daughter Sally’s teacher. This episode is entitled “The Color Blue,” and they have a discussion about a boy in her class who wonders if the blue that he sees is the same blue that everyone else sees. She told the boy honestly that she didn’t know. Don's answer is, not surprisingly, a lot more cynical. Some of us might see something different, but we'd rather keep the differences to ourselves. I wonder what Don will think of the "do your own thing" meme coming a few years down the road.

At work, presumably the next day, Don complains that a commercial being staged for him has a pause in it that will ruin the impact. Peggy Olson, who was playing the lead role in the dramatization, comes up with a simple and effective way to streamline the commercial. Don’s happy and Peggy’s happy. Paul Kinsey, who dreamed up the initial version, is not and goes into full whine mode. It’s not pretty.

Meanwhile, back at the Draper residence, Don’s stops in to deposit apparently all of the $5,000 in cash from the signing bonus check Lane Pryce dropped by his office with the rest of the enormous emergency escape fund he keeps locked in his desk. Then, it’s off for beddy-bye with Miss Farrell, but things take a weird turn as her younger brother pops in unexpectedly, in need of help and a meal. She pushes Don to meet the embittered young epileptic. It's another shadow of Don’s tragic relationship with the younger brother he abandoned twice.

Back in the city, Don’s ex-surrogate older brother, Roger Sterling, and boss emeritus Bert Cooper discuss a 40^th anniversary party for the firm they once owned. The aging Mr. Cooper dreads it and Roger is unhappy about it as well; he’ll be forced to heap praise on Don, who is clearly no longer his buddy. The upshot is that it’s Bert Cooper’s party and he can beg off if he wants to – except it’s really not.

Then we have a scene that will definitely be a new exhibit in the “Betty Draper is a mean mom” case that the esteemed Mr. Harris has been building all season. This time, an innocent question from young Sally after she picks up the phone and the person on the other end hangs up causes her suddenly aggrieved mom to snap, “My goodness, Sally Draper, try not to take everything so personally.” As delivered with real anger by January Jones, it comes across as one of those inexplicable parental reactions that kids throw back at their parents decades later.

Of course, the real meaning of the incident is Betty's perhaps repressed knowledge of Don’s new affair and her own contradictory flirtations with power broker Henry Francis. By the end of the episode, we get denials from both Francis and Miss Farrell that either of them was the mystery caller. It's possible we’ll never find out who it was, but it sure makes a nice symbol of the hidden guilt of both Drapers.

Back at the office, the key account of the week for both Peggy and Paul is Western Union, the once gigantic telegraph company cut down to size first by the telephone and later by faxes and e-mail. Peggy efficiently works out her ideas, such as they are, on a Dictaphone. She is interrupted only by a single, ladylike burp. Meanwhile, Paul decides to drink his way to inspiration. Then, out comes what appears to be a soft towel for which I can only imagine one use. When a wank proves no more effective than booze, Paul calls out like the big baby he is for Peggy, never mind his past hissy fit. However, after narrowly avoiding catching him en flagrante masturbo, she has long since left for the evening.

Instead, he winds up chatting with a janitor named Achilles, as in the mythological hero of Homer’s The Iliad. The old gentlemen remarks that in his extended family the name is so common that if you call it out, nearly every head turns. For whatever reason, this leads to a flash of inspiration and Paul remarks that he’ll sleep well tonight. He drinks some more and passes out in the office, without writing a word down…And awakes the next morning in a panic and being driven to distraction by his secretary, Lois Sadler, apparently having kept her job after accidentally dismembering a superior a few episodes back via runaway tractor. This makes Sal Romano's departure last week all the more unfairly ironic. Apparently splattering the office with a coworker's blood is a relatively minor sin, but failing to have sex is a major one if it threatens a crucial account. Follow the money.

On the not-at-homefront, Don's involvement with Miss Farrell is becoming more fraught and a little strange as she follows him onto his train briefly. The habitual womanizer is uncomfortable but also seems thoroughly absorbed by the beautiful teacher. In many respects, she’s the opposite of Betty. Down to earth, in love with her job as a teacher, capable of real joy, and not completely self-absorbed. This leads to a strange scene between Don and her brother who he is supposed to take to a new job in Massachusetts. At the young man's insistence, Don winds up dropping him off in the middle of nowhere instead of taking him to kind of menial job that people with epilepsy were apparently once relegated to. Again, I find it impossible not to think of Adam Whitman here.

The past comes back in an even more direct way, however, when Betty finds the key to Don’s desk and does the obvious. The wads of cash are no shock at all compared to the papers, family photos, and other material that may certainly lead her to the conclusion that Don hasn’t always been Don -- and then there are those divorce papers from the wife of the original Don Draper. The episode ends with Betty grudgingly keeping up appearances and keeping the matter to herself for now. She is, however, dropping some pretty big hints that something is extremely wrong, but Don clearly doesn’t want to know.

There’s a different kind of drama as Lane Pryce is tasked with ensuring that Bert Cooper change his mind and show up at the party. The overlords will be selling Sterling Cooper and he’s still a key part of the package they want to put on display. He is able to persuade Cooper to appear by appealing to his old man’s vanity; if he’s not there, everyone will think he’s sick. But, before this, Cooper delivers the most memorable and strangest line of the episode in response to his very British style of persuasion. “You really pore the honey on, then you lick it off.” It's a zinger with a definite “eww” factor.

One interesting side aspect of this new development regarding the sale of Sterling Cooper is that Lane seems genuinely upset by it. Never mind that it may allow him to return to London and perhaps save his marriage to his terminally homesick wife. Possibly, Lane doesn't entirely want it to be saved. Perhaps he's got just a bit of Don Draper in him.

Also, Paul Kinsey lives to posture another day. Coming to a meeting with Don with absolutely nothing prepared and believing he's lost possibly the best idea of his life, he is clearly chastened. (After so much booze and a wank? Probably, it was crap.) He finds sympathy first from Peggy, who is too forgiving and says the same thing has happened to her. More surprisingly, he gets a similar, and very funny, reaction from an initially furious but then completely sympathetic Don.

Paul's quote of a Chinese proverb “The faintest ink is better than the best memory," leads to one of those sudden bits of inspiration born of misadventures where, on rare occasions, Sterling Cooper becomes the offices of McMahon & Tate from “Bewitched.” The Western Union campaign is “You can’t frame a phone call.” Suddenly Don is Mr. Positive Guy Boss as he prepares to go to the big anniversary shindig (and  secret sales exhibition) accompanied by his lovely and entirely suspecting wife.

And now is the time on the “Mad Men” recap, where we throw out the random thoughts….

* Tonight’s episode, like several this season, was credited to Kater Gordon and creator Matthew Weiner, who shared an Emmy a few weeks back. If you’ve been following the entertainment press much lately, you likely know that Gordon, who was promoted from being a writer’s assistant last year, had her name on numerous episodes, and shared the Emmy, has now been let go. I'm no expert on this, but that seems like an unusual trajectory. It's definitely attracted attention. Usually, the only writers who get this much ink are showrunners.

* I wonder if anyone is going to start combing through The Iliad to see if they can figure out what Paul Kinsey’s inspiration might have been. I looked at some quotes and found numerous lines that could apply to “Mad Men,” but nothing that would make a good ad for telegraph services.

* It’s quite late as I finish this and I’m not really sure what to make of tonight’s show other than that it was as open to interpretation as usual and completely absorbing despite some moments that, on reflection, feel a bit contrived. Clearly, though, things are accelerating, but just where they are all going is not something I’ll dare speculate on. I will say that last season’s final episodes had a slightly surreal feeling to them, and I wouldn’t be surprised if that happened again.

* Finaly, I want to conclude with praise for Robert Morse’s work as Bert Cooper in "The Color Blue." There was a touching sadness mixed in with the witty vitriol of the old, Ayn Rand-loving, soap-opera watching cynic tonight. Morse is an actor we’ve been too much deprived of since his sixties career peak, and his presence on “Mad Men” has been a brilliant touch throughout. Tonight’s performance was as funny as usual but also incredibly poignant. Wonderful work.

Well, I think it's far to say that they had dirty dreams in the '60s, based on what's running through Betty's mind when the phone rings and wakes her up...and when she's holding the baby, no less. Turns out it's Connie, calling for Don and trying to wrack his brain about a business decision. Whether or not it's helpful for Connie isn't immediately evident, but it prevents Don from getting back to sleep, leading him to a late-night drive and a close encounter with Sally's teacher on a jog, eventually finding him heading to his office and crashing on the couch. Betty, meanwhile, tries to be a dutiful mother and see the kids off to the school, but when she's given the opportunity to bail out and go to sleep, she does...but not before first composing a letter to Henry Francis, asking, "Does anyone else read this?" The answer: not if Betty's going to be writing him.

The Lucky Strike ad campaign looked like it was going to result in Sal getting lucky, but after rejecting the drunken advances of Lee Garner, Jr., the company's representative, he quickly found himself in a position where the guy wanted him off the project. It was such a surreal event for all parties concerned...Garner for having his advances shunned, Sal for getting hit on in the first place, and then Harry for getting the alcohol-fueled phone call from Garner...that it's no wonder that the whole situation ended up completely FUBAR, but I have to admit that I didn't expect it to truly end with Sal getting dismissed from Sterling-Cooper. My wife was particularly fascinated by the conversation between Don and Sal, specifically when Sal questioned the sort of reaction that would've occurred had it been a woman who had been hit on: "It would depend on who the woman was and what I knew about her." It was harsh, but it's not like we're dealing with a world of H.R. interactions and constant lawsuits. We're in Take-One-For-The-Team territory, and although you could see from Don's reaction that his knowledge of Sal's shenanigans doesn't mean in any way that he approves of them, one must rise above and look at the business side of the situation...and the fact of the matter is that Lucky Strike is a big account, and Sal should've done anything to save it. Anything.

Aside from Sal's storyline, this week was predominantly about two burgeoning relationships: the one between Betty and Henry, and the one between Don and...Connie? Yeah, it's fair to say that, although Don's obviously a smitten kitten when it comes to Sally's teacher, the more important goings-on this week were between him and Mr. Hilton. It's made imminently clear that it's not exactly easy to have a normal sleeping schedule with you're working with Connie, but it's even harder to figure out where you stand with the man. The two of them shared several in-depth conversations over late night drinks (including the great moment when they're enjoying a little bit of "hair tonic" from circa the Prohibition era), and Connie all but said that he viewed Don as being like a son, but by episode's end, Connie seems furious at Don for being unable to read him like a book about this whole "Hiltons on the moon" concept. Between this incident and the Lucky Strike fiasco, then coming home to Betty being Betty, given what we know about Don, it's only to be expected that he would be going out trolling for a little stress relief. Still, how about that pitiful excuse of claiming that Connie called, even though he knows full well that Betty would've heard the phone if he had? Man, Don's just not even trying any more...

Meanwhile, Betty's attempts at pursuing something with Henry didn't exactly go as she'd planned. When it appeared that they'd be able to enjoy their handwritten communiques without prying eyes, she started to get excited, but then he tried to take it a step further by showing up at the Draper residence, and that completely freaked her out. (By the way, just how stupid does Betty think Carla is, anyway?) Still, after their subsequent phone call, she started to get excited again, only be totally let down when he bailed out on a campaign-related appearance and sent someone else in his stead. Clearly, this is a case where the man and the woman are approaching the situation from two completely different directions, but you can kind of understand her reaction of showing up at his office and throwing the locked box at him. And, hey, it did lead to a passionate kiss...well, you know, as passionate as an ice queen like Betty gets. But in the end, she backed away from the situation, and it looked for a moment like the relationship between Don and Sally's teacher was traveling on a parallel track, but if you really thought it would end that way, then you're just not giving the old Don Draper charm enough credit. Instead, he's going back to school, and Betty...well, she's back to dreaming the same dreams she was when the episode back.

A few random comments to close:

* Peggy teamed up with the two new guys to offer a possible Hilton campaign, but her new comrades in arms didn't do her any favors, though at least part of that may have been due to Don's lack of sleep. It did, however, result in at least one great line from Don toward the young buck with the highly accented speech: "Now that I can finally understand you, I'm less impressed with what you have to say."

* I thought it was hilarious that Pete spent the entire scene on the set of the Lucky Strike commercial coughing up a lung from his attempt to smoke one of the client's cigarettes.

* I loved that, when Don came home from having to back Sterling's decision to fire Sal, he already had bottle and glass in hand before he answered Betty's question, "How was your day?"

There haven't been many episodes in the history of "Mad Men" which have quite as streamlined as this week's entry: it was split evenly down the middle between Don and Betty and Pete. Oh, sure, other characters made appearances during the course of the hour, but when you look back at the description of the episode on TiVo ("Don and Betty go on a business trip; Pete helps a neighbor"), it's hard to argue against its simplicity because, well, those were the two stories this week.

When we first see Pete Campbell this week, he's reading..."Ebony"? Has the world gone topsy-turvy...? No, of course not. This is just the residual effect of his discussion about how African-Americans have specific purchasing tendencies. Leave it to Pete to dive headlong into the concept. But what else has the guy got to do? His wife's away...and it shows, with his offer to buy the guys a drink. The poor bastard is definitely one of those guys who can't stand to be alone, and his tendencies toward alcoholism are evident, if only by his television viewing habits. (Many a member of AA has testified that they took their first drink while watching "Davy & Goliath." But don't quote me on that, since I just made it up.) In his quest to keep busy, Pete helps out his neighbor's au pair, Gudrun, by offering to help solve her dilemma with the dress that she accidentally messed up, which results in a couple of interesting developments. The first, of course, is that the trip to the store leads to an unexpected encounter with Joan, whose face is almost as red as her hair when she's outed by Pete in her post-Sterling-Cooper gig. She replaces the dress for him, he asks her not to mention the incident to Trudy, and it's pretty evident that she'd prefer that he kept his mouth shut about seeing her, too. When he goes to return the dress to Gudrun, he promptly hits on her and gets shot down when she assures him that she has a boyfriend. He shrugs and accepts her claims until he gets a few drinks in him, at which point he returns to the apartment in the wee hours, says he deserves the chance to see her in the dress, and then quickly gets her out of it.

Yes, Pete's still just as lecherous now as he was with Peggy in Season 1. The difference this time...? He gets nailed to the wall by the au pair's boss, who basically says, "If you can't keep it in your pants, at least don't take it out in the building." When Trudy gets home, we bear witness to the incredibly awkward elevator ride with her, Pete, and Gudrun, and once they get back into their apartment, Pete has something approximating a nervous breakdown when Trudy comes on to him. Surely it's not out of guilt...or is it? I really thought he was on the verge of asking for a divorce for a second. Instead, he admits to no wrong-doing (or if he did, we didn't actually get to see it), but he does inform her that she shouldn't leave him alone again. Translation: whatever happened while she was gone is her fault, not his.

As for the Don and Betty storyline, it's really far more about Betty than Don this week. When their storyline kicks off, Don's off to catch lightning bugs with the kids while Betty continues on her quest to try and save the reservoir. As it turns out, the quest proves successful when her dear Mr. Francis turned up at the city council meeting and, by throwing his weight around as the governor's right-hand man, saved the day and got the reservoir a reprieve. In return for his assistance, Francis decides he deserves a kiss. The sexual tension immediately prior to the lip-lock was downright palpable, and although Betty didn't exactly seem ready for a roll in the hay afterwards (she just wore her usual pissed-off expression), she neither pulled away during the event nor complained afterward. It seemed clear that there would be more to this relationship...but, then, the Drapers flew off to Rome on a Hilton-related business trip and seemed to rekindle some of their marital magic. Betty put on her best beehive (or a hairstyle not entirely unlike one, anyway) and utilized her knowledge of Italian to shoot down a couple of rico suaves, seemingly doing a bit of roleplaying with Don up until the point that Connie turned up. I liked his description of Don as "an indecently lucky man," and, indeed, Don got nice and indecent with Betty while in Rome, so much so that it really looked like the two of them had finally fallen back in love with each other.

Unfortunately, it seems that what happens in Rome stays in Rome: almost as soon as they got back, Betty had returned to full bitch mode, a move made all the more surprising by Don's attempt at being romantic via his jewelry purchase. I guess we can blame that on Sally, whose macking on neighbor boy Ernie in her parents' absence led to her treating her teasing brother like he was her opponent in Mike Tyson's Punchout. Upon her return, Betty actually offered a moment of sweetness and understanding to her daughter about her first kiss...but, apparently, the conversation led her on a trip down Memory Lane that made her learn to hate Don all over again.

All told, it was another slow week on "Mad Men." Let's hope things pick up a bit next week.

There was always going to be a very good chance that this week's episode would in no way live up to the level of excitement set by last week's episode. I mean, really, how do you top the de-foot-ification of a British ad exec? Even taking that into consideration, however. tonight's "Mad Men" still seemed pretty slow.

Not bad, just slow.

When we first see Don Draper, he looks like he's been through the wringer, but when we next see him, he's getting spiffed up for work. There was a brief moment where I thought it was a case of quick recovery, but, no, we were flashing back to see the path that led him to this point. After a momentary stop in the living room to offer up his complete indifference to Betty's plans for the living room (but still nonetheless throw in a suggestion that the interior designer apparently didn't see herself), Don was off to work, where he was surprised to find that Conrad Hilton was already waiting for him. It was hilarious to see the guys at Sterling-Cooper giddy as schoolgirls about Hilton's presence, but Hilton was all business, indicating his disappointment in the lack of a Bible and family photos in Don's office. Despite these issues, Don still found himself on the fast track to handle accounts for the Waldorf Astoria, New York Hilton, and Statler Hilton...but not, however, until he signed a new contract with Sterling-Cooper. Although Don's insistence in remaining without a contract may have ostensibly been a business move, I couldn't help but notice his comments about how he gave his word to Hilton. Wow, remember the days when a man's word could actually serve as his bond without any contracts needing to be signed to back it up?

Betty and her gaggle of gal pals in the Junior League, meanwhile, were tackling environmental concerns, leading Betty to contact her close personal friend Henry Francis in an attempt to get him to help them with their cause. The two of them had a lovely luncheon, but it wasn't until the closing moments of their time together - when Henry put his hand over Betty's eyes to keep her from looking at the eclipse - that a spark really went off with Betty. Interesting...

Don spent a lot of time in the office deflecting questions about the Hilton situation, even enduring Pete trying to get his mitts on the account, but when Peggy tried to get her foot in the door to assist...man, talk about shitting on someone's parade. I'm not saying that his comments were completely and totally what led her to sleep with Duck, but they sure as hell didn't hurt. Their close encounter was one which I didn't see coming, but I think it's fair to say that Peggy's starting to get the hang of using her feminine abilities to get what she wants in the business world. I'm not saying it's right, I'm just saying that she might be able to use them to her advantage.

A few random comments:

* Betty once again proved what a grouch of a mother she is, yelling at her son for hanging up the phone, even though he did exactly what she told him to do. Be more specific next time, Betty. He's only a kid, for God's sake!

* I don't know what to make of this thing with Don's teacher, except to observe that it's hard to believe Don's going to hold out much longer without acting on her obvious attraction to him.

* I'm probably supposed to have been fascinated and enthralled by the surrealistic scene of Don picking up the high hitchhikers, only to take a couple of reds, see a joke-telling hillbilly, and get punched in the face, but I just thought it was weird, personally.

For me, the best moment of tonight's episode was the one-on-one scene between Don and Cooper, when Cooper subtly but pointedly brought up his knowledge of Don's identity as a way of hinting that it might be a good idea to sign the contract. Hey, it worked, didn't it?

Here's hoping next week's "Mad Men" is more exciting than this week's...

Well, I'll say this for tonight's episode of "Mad Men": it might have had to suffer the indignity of airing opposite the Emmy Awards (where the series ultimately took home its second win for Outstanding Drama Series, thank you very much), but that didn't mean that it had to offer up a throwaway episode. Not that anyone would've expected Matthew Weiner to turn in anything less than another outstanding chapter in this season's stellar saga of the folks at Sterling-Cooper, but, wow, I don't think anyone could've anticipated the turn of events that we ended up getting. There was so much going on in this episode that I know I'll end up missing some of it, but here goes...

Things started and ended this evening with Sally Draper. The addition of a new child to a household is always difficult for the existing siblings, but it was definitely a bit different for Sally. First, she was afraid of what was to happen when Don turned off her light, but as the episode progressed, she basically began to believe that perhaps she was being haunted by the spirit of her late grandpa. You can kind of understand her concern, given that -as she observed - the new baby is named Gene, sleeps in Grandpa's old room, and even looks a little bit like him. Fortunately, Don got her all straightened out by episode's end...with virtually no help from Betty! Seriously, if she's not one of the worst mothers in TV history, she's got to be right up there. How anyone can have three kids and still end up as cold and detached from them as she always seems to be is beyond me.

Let's be honest, though: Sally's story, while serving as a very nice way of book-ending the episode, paled in significance to the shake-up within the offices of Sterling-Cooper this week.

First, there was the big meeting of all Sterling-Cooper employees, so that the announcement could be made that the board of directors from Putnam Powell Lowe would be arriving for a friendly chat and to evaluate the office's performance, with the added bonus that their visit would be totally screwing up everyone's 4th of July holiday, not to mention putting a wrench in the plans for Joan's last day at the office. John Hooker got in a good joke at Paul's expense, telling him that he'd be expected to shave his beard, thereby resulting in an indignant Mr. Kinsey demanding to know, "Who the hell are you people?" Settle down, Paul, settle down. Despite Sterling's suspicions that the Brits might be flying across the ocean for the sole purpose of getting their knobs polished, Cooper's theory is that they're coming to see Don in an attempt to study him and determine his specific American genius, and Cooper floats the idea that they're going to offer Don a dual position in both New York and London. It's a tempting enough concept for Don to ask Betty what she thinks of the idea of living in London, so you can imagine his disappointment when it later turns out that Cooper's just had an overactive imagination.

Joan's storyline tonight was certainly a strong one. Even in what appeared to be her final moments in the office, her banter back and forth with John Hooker was pretty snappy, even if she did get her facts wrong when she brought up the sex scandal in the British government. It was when she got home and waited up for her fiancee, however, that things really got interesting. For viewers, there's been a lot of tension in that relationship due to the way he's treated her in the past, but their conversation tonight felt about as real as a scripted drama can feel. He's trying to tell her what's happened to him at the hospital, she's sympathetic and trying to be supportive, but as she's doing so, he's torn between accepting what she's saying in the spirit in which it's intended and lashing out and saying, "Oh, you just don't understand..." The stops and starts and uncertainties within their discussion were so authentic that one has to imagine they're ripped straight from somebody's real life.

When the gents from Putnam Powell Lowe showed up...well, first off, with all due respect to Charles Shaughnessey as an actor, as soon as I saw him, I still thought, "Hey, it's Mr. Sheffield!" But he does still cut an authoritarian figure, so it worked well within the part he was playing here. I laughed out loud when they took the stroll through the offices of Sterling-Cooper and passed by Paul's office, where he was sitting on his desk, playing his guitar and singing, but then I started paying more attention to the young gentleman known as Guy McKendrick. Once I did, I realized just how much he was being set up to be the Don Draper of the British office. (Maybe that's why Don looked so mystified when he was introduced to him: he couldn't quite place why he looked so darned familiar.) After touring the facilities, the trio swung in to see Layne Price, who proceeded to be completely and totally shit on by his fellow countrymen. Seriously, how completely cold up was it for them to give him a cobra as a way of telling him that he was being shipped off to Bombay? Ouch. And then when he complained, their snappy comeback was to say, "One of your greatest qualities is that you always do what you're told." Anyone who thinks that Brits can't be just as devious as Americans needs only to see this episode to be set straight.

The reorganization meeting proved highly illuminating, both with the announcement that Harry had scored the only promotion - behold the power of TV! - and the complete and total omission of Roger Sterling from the flow chart (suuuuuuure it's just an oversight), and Guy's speech before the huddled masses was one which was clearly intended to rally the troops, even though it served to bring Joan to tears. I kept waiting for her to say, "Actually, I'm not leaving after all," but I knew she'd be too proud to do that. The conversation between Don and Peggy was cold, demonstrating that she's still not happy with him about his refusal to go to bat for her last week. Meanwhile, Sterling's pissy reaction to being left off the chart resulted in a great line from Cooper: "We took their money, and now we have to do what they say." Well, maybe Don doesn't. What a nice touch, having it turn out that the fella he had drinks with at the bar a few episodes ago was actually Conrad Hilton. I'll be interested to see where this leads.

Okay, we've waited long enough: it's time to talk about the mower.

Boy, when Ken drove into the office on that John Deere, who could've imagined where it would go later in the episode? At the time, I was more focused on Pete's expression, which is always classic whenever he's reacting to Ken getting the upper hand with an account, and even when they were tootling around the office later, it absolutely never occurred to me that the goddamned blade would even still be on the thing, let alone be in a position to be activated. But leave it to Lois to find a way to not only drop it down but cruise right over Guy's foot, then through the wall of a nearby office. The blood spatter over the creative team was ghastly, and yet I was laughing my ass off. In fact, when it happened, I actually yelled, "What the fuck...?!?" I don't have a clue the last time I was that surprised by a moment of television. Rest assured, they'll be talking about this for weeks, and although I wouldn't put it past Mr. Weiner to top it by season's end, it will prove to be a signature moment of the series. It really was that momentous. You don't get TV moments like that very often. I don't know which mocking comment I preferred best: the suggestion that "somewhere in this business, this has happened before," or the comment that Guy might lose his foot, "right when he got it in the door."

No, wait: the best was when it was said that Guy's career in advertising was over, explaining that "the doctors say he'll never golf again."

So it looks like Layne Price isn't going to Bombay after all. But is Joan going to stick around Sterling-Cooper as well...? Well, given her quick thinking during the mower incident, it's safe to say that she's still well respected around the office. I guess we'll see if she's too proud to come back.

First, I have to comment on the irony that real-life father Will Harris is busy documenting tonight's season finale of "True Blood," while non-family guy me gets to write-up the episode where Don and Betty Draper finally have their third child.

Of course, that's only one of the key events on tonight's show. We also witness a financial squeeze from the new British overlords of Sterling Cooper while a mercenary variation of civil rights awareness descends on Pete Campbell. Also, Herman "Duck" Phillips returns to attack from the outside and prompts some proactive behavior from cash-deficient Peggy Olson.

****

"The Fog" opens as Don and the extremely pregnant Betty have a conference with Sally's teacher prompted by a nasty fight with a schoolmate. Betty's revelation of the sudden passing of Grandpa Gene last episode, however, causes the teacher to become upset and cut the meeting short. She mentions, however, that the death might explain Sally's unusual interest in the murder of African-American civil rights leader Medger Evers.

Things aren't too smooth at work, either. Don walks in late to a meeting in which Sal Romano is being grilled about the details of his expense account on his and Don's nearly fateful trip a couple of episodes back. When he realizes that British honcho Lane Pryce is going to be discussing excess spending on pencils, he leaves abruptly. Later, Pryce appears in his office and, after some brief snippiness, complains about people drinking at work -- reasonable enough by today's standards. Don responds that creative people tend to be nonproductive, until they are productive, which is equally reasonable to anyone who knows anything about creative people.

Don pours a couple of Scotches and suggests a more proactive stance towards making money by working with Bert Cooper and Roger Sterling, rather than harming morale by cutting back on expense accounts. The meeting ends on a surprisingly cordial note.

Seemingly from out of nowhere, Herman "Duck" Phillips surprises Pete Campbell with a phone call. Rather than falling wholly into a bottle after being vanquished last season, he is now possibly back on the wagon and at Grey Advertising (today, Grey Global Group), which I gather is a historically Jewish firm. Pete accepts with some fairly great trepidations, which turn into outright anger when he arrives at the lunch and finds Peggy Olson already there, sipping a Bloody Mary. Perhaps assuming he's once again going to be pitted against a contemporary, he threatens to leave. But the very gentile Duck is in Mr. Jewish Cool mode, suggesting Pete stay for a "nosh."

"Two months at Grey and you're already having a 'nosh,'" responds Pete. Like everyone else in NYC, even young Mr. Mega-goy is influenced by Jewish intonations without knowing it.

Pete sits down but soon regrets it. The conversation that follows is far more awkward than Duck can possibly realize as he alludes to a "secret relationship" between Pete and Peggy.  Keeping up the theme of Judaica, he comes on like the great lawgiver of the Torah (which makes sense, given as he's really actor Mark Moses) and offers to lead to two young adfolks to "the promised land" of Grey. Pete leaves in a huff, while Peggy keeps her cool.

Meanwhile, back at the Draper household, Don picks up the phone to hear the voice of Miss Farrell, Sally's teacher, who I failed to mention earlier is -- naturally -- extremely attractive. Drink in hand, she is calling to apologize. Something about her father dying when she was roughly Sally's age and  making the situation too personal. The call itself is an embarrassment and she says so. Don is chivalrous about the whole thing, and perhaps a bit more than that, if only out of habit.

Don has to end the call abruptly when Betty calls. The baby is coming. Don gets a bit comically confused. Not quite in the manner of sixties sitcom fathers-to-be, but still amusing. Betty asks who was calling, Don says "nobody." Maybe he doesn't want to rehash her father's death at a moment like that. Nevertheless, he's also keeping his options open.

At the hospital, we're get our obligatory reminder of how things have changed over the decades when a friendly, older nurse informs Don that "his job is done." This will be the opposite of a natural childbirth. Betty gets so drugged up that, between occasional bouts of unpleasantness, she gives birth in what amounts to a dream state. In one key moment, she is back at home and finds her later father mopping up blood as her mother -- who appears a bit more swarthy than you might expect -- is standing next to a black man, who I suppose is Betty's vision of Medgar Evers. "You see what happens to people who speak up?" mom warns.

Dad is more pleasant, if that's the word for it. "You're a housecat. You're very important and you have little to do.”

In the hospital waiting room, Don briefly bonds over more Scotch with a worried prison guard whose wife is having a breach birth. Once again, we see Don being far kinder and more sensitive toward people who are not a part of his daily life. Easier that way, I guess.

Soon enough both the guard and Don are the proud fathers of baby boys. Betty informs him that the newest Draper boy will be named Eugene, as in Gene. Don returns groggily to work after half a day off and things are hopping. A conversation with gray-haired Roger Sterling starts off in the usual jocular manner of congratulations, but the dark undercurrents continue as their friendship seems increasingly like a thing of the past.

Meanwhile, Pete acts on a brain storm he's been having about the Admiral Television account. Noting that they seem to sell especially well in cities with large black populations, he buttonholes Hollis, the elevator operator, and questions him about what kind of television he bought (RCA) and why (he doesn't remember or care much; more important things are happening). Hollis is worried something he'll say might get him into trouble, but Pete is remarkably honest about what he's up to. We're not sure if he's simply too oblivious and privileged to be embarrassed about his in-your-face racial market research, or if he's really as un-bigoted as he seems to fancy himself. Maybe a bit of both.

Pete really does seem ignorant of the amount of hate being exposed by the civil rights movement. He goes into a meeting with Admiral executives and proposes "integrated" TV commercials in key cities to appeal to both white and black audiences. Pete's several years early with the idea, and the executives are horrified. One wonders if it's even legal and the other seems just plain offended. Later, Pete is called on the carpet fairly sharply by Bert Cooper and Roger Sterling while Lane Pryce is present.

Once the "flailing" is completed (and Sterling complains it wasn't as much fun as he'd hoped), Pryce remarks that maybe it's not an entirely wrong tack to consider with other clients. He might be new to our country, but he realizes that something is happening with the races in the U.S., and it could mean a whole new market and therefore lots of money. Pryce may be a little bit smarter than we've been giving him credit for. He at least is willing to try new approaches when it comes to finding cash.

Speaking of money, having been offered a new gig by Duck Phillips, Peggy approaches Don about a raise to bring her more in line with what the other copywriters are making. She even brings up some new laws mandating equal pay for equal work between the sexes. Don is unmoved, alluding to Pryce's penny-pinching over pads and pencils. Pete stops Peggy on the way out and tries to bully her into divulging the content of her talk with Don. She will have none of it.

The episode concludes as Don brings Betty back home from the hospital with little Eugene Scott Draper. Sally and little Bobby seem delighted. Betty's friend, Francine, wonders why she doesn't "force" Carla -- the Drapers' black housekeeper who doesn't appear in this episode -- to stay and help. When Francine asks her what the birth was like, the answer is that it was like a "fog."

***

Just a few random thoughts as I wrap up and return the reins to Mr. Harris, who'll be back at the Sterling Cooper salt mines next week.

* Matthew Weiner wasn't credited on this week's show. This week's writer was Kater Gordon and the director was Phil Abraham. Very solid work from both, even if aspects of the show tonight are perhaps a bit obvious.

* Can anyone out there identify the music that accompanies some of Betty's visions and is repeated over the end credits? I'm thinking it's drawn from one of Nino Rota's Fellini scores, possibly "Amarcord." While set in the forties, that movie came out ten years after all this. Would that be an anachronism?

* This week's overt movie reference was during Don and Lane Pryce's conversation on the topic of expense accounts and morale.

“You've obviously seen 'Bridge on the River Kwai'.”

"I've seen everything. You have the ticket stubs."

* I alluded to this before, but I guess it makes sense that this episode really brings us the more empathetic and even vulnerable side of Don. A moment where the prison guard, their bonding now over, ignores him at the hospital is surprising in that Don is noticeably disappointed, maybe even hurt. It could be a reflection of some kind of need to atone for his tragic denial of his brother from the first season.  On the other hand, a scene where Don cooks a late night for snack for himself and Sally -- whose becoming a surprisingly vital part of the "Mad Men" ensemble -- was also especially sweet. Like the guard tells him after hearing the news of his son's birth, at least right now he really seems to want to be a better man.

UPDATE: The music over the end credits and during Peggy's hallucinations turns out to be from 2001's "Sex and Lucia" and was composed by Alberto Iglesias, who was about Sally's age in 1963. Talk about anachronisms. You can hear it/see it in it's original context in this YouTube clip.

First off, my thanks to Bob Westal for quite capably filling in for me last week. It's not that I couldn't have blogged both "True Blood" and "Mad Men," it's just that I really, really didn't want to, so I greatly appreciated his assistance...and I hope he didn't hate it so much that he's considering backing out of doing the same thing next week while I'm tackling the "True Blood" season finale.

Wow, remember the good ol' days when kids could get away with taking the wheel for awhile while their dad...or, in this case, their granddad...was sitting in the passenger seat? Actually, even *I* don't remember the days when kids were doing it quite that young. Maybe it's just because we lived in a pretty heavily populated area, but while I remember sitting in my father's lap and handling the steering wheel, I don't think he trusted me to drive like that on a public street until I was, like, 14. Maybe we can chalk it up to Gene's increasing senility...? I spent the first part of the episode convinced that Gene was going to suddenly snap and scream at Sally, "You took my five dollars, you little shit," but when he sat down with Betty to discuss his funeral arrangements, I sensed that we'd see them put into action sooner than later...and, of course, I was right. (As far as the disposition of his worldly goods, wow, isn't it amazing how much has changed since the '60s when it comes to the importance of fur as a status symbol?) If Gene had to depart the "Mad Man" universe, at least he got a lot of love in his final few episodes. This week's tense discussion between him and Don over the merits of war was one of the moments which makes you nod as you take in the similarities to today's world, though you rarely hear anyone today dismiss a suggestion that war might be bad by replying, "Maybe, but it makes a man out of you." That whole sequence was great, particularly Jon Hamm's acting with his eyebrows as Don listened to Gene giving Bobby a lesson on how to cut open a box properly, but, damn, I wanted to hear the story about how Gene got that fan!

Gene and Sally continued their bonding sessions - last week, it was The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire; this week, it was ice cream - and grew closer, but as soon as he made that comment about the chocolate tasting like oranges, I immediately thought, "Uh-oh, that ain't a good sign," and promptly Googled the symptom. As a result, I was horrified...much as I suspect the rest of the viewing audience was...that we were going to see Gene suddenly slump against the wheel while driving his grandchildren to school. Thankfully, he at least made it to the A&P before he had his stroke or seizure or whatever it was that claimed his life. After the episode was over, I said to my wife, "You know, even in the '60s, I just can't believe that someone would arrive at the house and present the news to a very pregnant woman like Betty without first having her sit down." She felt otherwise, suggesting that tact wasn't necessarily first and foremost on the minds of those folks back then, but I'm still skeptical. Even so, however, the imagery of poor little Sally, sobbing against the front door in her ballerina outfit, was heartbreaking...even if it quickly slipped into annoyance at Betty. Seriously, is she the worst mother on this show...?

Actually, come to think of it, there are quite a lot of really shitty moms on this series. (What kind of childhood did Matthew Weiner have, anyway?) Certainly, Peggy Olson's mother isn't exactly peaches and cream, either, given that her reaction to her daughter getting her own place in the city was to say, "You'll get raped." Hey, thanks, Ma!

Despite Mother Olson's feelings on the matter, it's no surprise that Peggy would continue along her path of self-discovery by getting out from under the yoke of her family. Mind you, her classified ad writing skills could do with a bit of work, as Joan's brilliantly highbrow joke indicated ("It reads like the stage directions for an Ibsen play"), and despite expanding her mind last episode, she's still so naive. Even with Lois using the most stilted delivery imaginable when she prank-called her, Peggy still bought into every word until the guys' laughter finally gave them away. And her idea of an angry response...? "You're a jerk!" Strong words, Peggy. Let's hope you and Carla Gallo work out as roommates, despite the cultural differences between the Norwegians and the Swedes.

But with all of these family shenanigans, let's not forget about all of the business going on within the walls of Sterling-Cooper this week. I wasn't sure if Don's good nature was going to lead him to demand that the firm stop taking advantage of poor, deluded Ho-Ho and his dreams of making Jai Alai into the next big thing, but after meeting with Horace Cook, Sr., and hearing the man's willingness to allow his son to follow his dream, despite its ridiculousness ("It's like Polish handball; you can't even play it if you're left-handed"), he basically just shrugged and said, "Hey, if his dad doesn't mind, why should we?" Hey, that reminds me: I'm interested in fast-tracking an action-adventure series about a jai alai player who's also a secret agent, so if you're interested in submitting a spec script, drop me a line. But, seriously, folks, the board meeting with Ho-Ho was one of the funniest scenes in "Mad Men" history, as far as I'm concerned.

As far as the Patio campaign, Sal managed to get his big break into the world of commercial direction, even if the final product didn't end up floating the client's boat. But, hey, it's just further proof that there's only one Ann-Margret, baby...not that Sal doesn't do a cracking good impression of her moves, by God. Now that was quite a performance. It was already clear that the sight of Kitty in a lime-green negligee wasn't enough to get his motor running, but, man, his unabashed excitement at recreating that "Bye Bye, Birdie" sequence - and her attempt to look happy for him while dying inside at the inarguable realization about which team he bats for - was decidedly disconcerting to watch.

In closing, I just had to mention that, in the waning moments of the episode, as a still-mourning and now highly pissed-off Sally watched the news footage of the Buddhist monk who'd sent himself on fire, despite knowing in my heart just how incongruous it would be, I secretly hoped that we'd get a close-up of Sally's face, lit only by the TV, as "Killing in the Name" began to play over the closing credits. I mean, clearly, she was on the verge of screaming at Betty, "Fuck you, I won't do what you tell me!"