Eta: I guess the part Megan's friend got was on Dark Shadows? Nice timing!

I noticed that, too. I wondered if it was some bizarre kind of product placement, or it just happened!

The timing was coincidental. It was the title of the episode too.

I was wondering if the lines she was reading were from an actual Dark Shadows episode and if the Mad Men character had the same name as the actor who originally read them.

and if the Mad Men character had the same name as the actor who originally read them.

I wondered that too because in the credits she had a first and last name, which would be unusual for a walk-on character, but would make sense if they really wanted to tie it to the show.

I guess I could go look up the credits on IMDB...

I saw this video on Gawker, and it couldn't have been more Parkery without a social disorder.

Jilli may get a kick out of this Amanda Marcotte at Pandagon is now a "Dark Shadows" addict, thanks to the Mad Men episode: [link]

But in the lead-up to this, I realized I didn't actually know much about "Dark Shadows". The movie looks wretched,* but it turns out that the original series is streaming on Netflix. So I fired it up, figuring I'd start in the second season when things got good (which is actually where Netflix starts the series at all), and that I'd take in a couple of episodes to get a feel for it. What happened instead is a bit of a "Dark Shadows" binge. That show rules. It's like eating candy. Deliciously campy candy, replete with silly vampire stuff and great 60s hair.

Further on:

I think soap operas tend to be viewed as "women's entertainment", and so their self-awareness and their skill at story-telling is discounted. (As well as their ability to churn out an astounding amount of product with limited resources.) But "Mad Men" actually owes a great debt to soap operas. To write a great soap opera, you have to be able to go a long time onscreen with "nothing" really happening---i.e., lots of relationship-building and table-setting, but no big plot twists---without boring your audience to death. As is suggested in this episode, one way soaps do that is with delightfully hammy acting, which "Mad Men" obviously has to shun. But mostly they do it by making you care about the characters so that their little dramas seem as important to you as they are to the characters.

TBS and TNT schedules:

Leverage is back on July 15th.

Leverage is on at 8pm now? Wasn't it on at 9 before?

I think so.

No Mad Men discussion at all? Not even anyone gleefully shouting "THERE'S AN AIRPLANE HERE TO SEE YOU!"?