Mad Men #27 (3.01): Happy Birthday, Dick

Real title: "Out of Town"

[I've now seen everything through Season 4. I don't know how many of these I will end up recapping, nor how long it will take; I assume they've already been recapped to death elsewhere, so this is mostly for my own enjoyment and I'm not going into the kind of detail I used to.]

Don heats some milk on the stove for pregnant Betty and flashes back (not really, because he can't possibly remember this) to the night he was born. Like most of his childhood flashbacks, he imagines it all taking place inside the Draper home:

Abigail Whitman has had yet another stillbirth despite her constant prayers for a healthy baby. Her husband Archibald has been visiting a prostitute and refuses to wear a condom; that woman's baby is quite healthy, but she doesn't want it. What she wants is to cut off Archie's dick and boil it in hog fat. She murmurs this repeatedly. Unfortunately, she dies before she has the chance. The midwife takes this baby to Abigail and explains that the boy's name is "Dick" because of his mother's dying wish.

[Is that how Dick really got his name, or is it just the way Don imagines it? The midwife didn't mention the hog fat threat to Abigail, so how did he hear about it?]

Sterling-Cooper has seen some firings ever since Putnam, Powell, & Lowe took over. The latest casualty is the head of accounts. They would have laid him off sooner, but held off because his wife had cancer!

Lane Pryce - Sterling-Cooper's new financial officer from PPL - calls Pete into his office. Thinking he's about to be fired, Pete chats awkwardly while he waits for the axe to fall. Instead, Lane offers him the position of head of accounts. Pete is so elated, he forgets to even ask if he's getting a raise.

Then Lane calls Ken in and offers him the same position. Ken takes the offer with far more calmness and asks what he'll be paid. ($21K, woohoo!)

Everything is different the next day when Pete and Ken discover that they have to share the position and split the accounts. Lane hints that it will be a competition. Ken has actually warmed up to the idea of being an account man, but Pete is livid and jealous that it can't be all his automatically. Trudy talks him down a bit, but he continues to sulk.

Also, Peggy now has her own secretary, named Lola.

Sal and Don go to Baltimore to meet with London Fog. A pretty flight attendant named Shelly shows interest in Don from the start. They have dinner together and go up to Don's room afterwards to get it on. (If I had a LOT more free time I would say more about this little storyline, because it's more complex than that and it's very good. But I don't have the time. Sorry. However, I will tell you that Don tells Shelly it's his birthday. It's really Dick's birthday, but this stranger is the only person he can share that with, because Don Draper's birth certificate has a different date on it.)

Meanwhile, in his own room, Sal is about to have his first gay sexual experience with the hotel's eager bellhop. Alas, there's a fire alarm. As Don scrambles down the fire escape with Shelly, he sees Sal through the window still getting dressed in his room. Don yells for Sal to hurry up. Sal gives Don a strange look. Then Don sees the bellhop.

Next day, they have their meeting with London Fog and are soon on another plane home. Sal waits tensely for Don to say something. Finally Don breaks the silence and prepares Sal for a very serious question. Sal looks nervous enough to vomit. Don asks Sal's opinion of his idea for a raincoat ad. The subtext is clear: So you're gay. And I cheated on my wife. You probably think that's my worst secret. We need never discuss any portion of this, at least not until later this season.

Back at Sterling-Cooper, Lane's secretary, John Hooker, is making a nuisance of himself. He is distracting the other secretaries, who find him charming. Joan isn't happy with him because he gets other people's secretaries to do his typing for him. He's annoyed that they call him by his first name rather than "Mr. Hooker." He feels that he is not the same kind of secretary as the women are and deserves more prestige. (He'd be more annoyed if he knew that Peggy calls him "Moneypenny" behind his back.) To keep the peace, Joan offers him an extra room for an office (which also houses Bert Cooper's ant farm) and even promises to hire a typist for him.

Freshly arrived from Baltimore (actually, a bit wilted), Don is not happy about the dual-account-managers arrangement. Roger pretends that he wasn't in favor of it. Pete enters Don's office, and it looks as though he's ready to issue an ultimatum or at least whine a lot; however, on seeing Roger, he backpedals. Before this can go develop an further, Bert comes in and hands Pete a brand new account, effectively communicating his preference for Pete over Ken. Pete's day is made!

Lane finds out about John's office and nixes it because after cutting 1/3 of Sterling-Cooper's workforce, it's not right to "go through their pockets as well." John will have to sit out front with all the other secretaries. John gazes wistfully at the ant farm, perhaps thinking of its queen, and sighs that this place is a gynocracy.

Betty makes Sally confess to busting the lock on Don's suitcase. She says she did it to keep him at home. "I'll always come home," Don promises earnestly. She finds the pin from Shelly's uniform in his luggage. "Did you get this for me?" A quick flash of guilt and horror sparks in his eyes, but it quickly passes, and he says yes, it's for Sally.

Don's ready for another season of nonstop lying!