Whodats and cheap toys

Thursday's edition ("Ladies Room") of the brilliant Mad Men featured some familiar faces:

Broadway legend Robert Morse played the other half of Sterling Cooper's top dogs, Bertram Cooper.

Roger Sterling's wife was played by Talia Balsam. You might recognize her from playing Malone's ex-wife on Without A Trace. She's also the daughter of actor Martin Balsam (and Joyce Van Patten) and George Clooney's ex-wife. And, she's currently married to actor John Slattery who plays Roger Sterling -- which makes them spouses on and off the camera. Slattery is also currently cast as Gabby's nefarious new husband on Desperate Housewives.

Andy Umberger was the shrink for Don's wife (who helpfully relayed the details of their therapy to Don). Whedon fans will recognize Umberger for having pulled off the "hat trick" of appearing on Firefly, Angel and Buffy. On Firefly, he was the captain of the Dortmunder in the pilot ep; on Angel he was the bizarre doctor Ronald Metzler who could separate his body parts in "I Fall to Pieces;" and on Buffy he was the wonderfully droll master of the vengeance demons, D'Hoffryn.

Yes, the drinking, smoking and Twilight Zone references were there to remind us of the setting for the show. But how awesome was it to not have seatbelts or child safety seats cluttering up the family station wagon? Even better? The kids playing and running around with dry cleaning bags over their heads. Cheap toys are always more fun when they don't have a "suffocation warning" printed on them.