North Star Writers Group

I got an iPod for Christmas. This proves that you can accomplish just about anything if you put your mind to it. And if you’re willing to whine a lot.

Now, I realize that not too long ago I wrote in this very column that I didn’t figure on ever having anything quite as, well, as extravagant as an iPod. Back in those dark Pre-iPod (PiP) days, I was ignorant of the fact that no normal adult could afford at any time to be caught as much as 100 feet away from his copy of Houses of the Holy.

(If you have no idea what Houses of the Holy might be, the chances are you weren’t born when Led Zeppelin recorded it. And if, like me, you came of age in the 1960s and were around to remember Houses of the Holy, the odds are pretty good that you don’t - 1960s and all. So in either case, don’t worry about it.)

So anyway, now I’m an iBeliever. I have my 1,715 favorite songs loaded on my iPod, accessible at the push of a button - actually, three pushes, a few laps around the wheel with my thumb, another push or two, then the realization that I’m still not getting my brain liquefied by Houses of the Holy because I left the ear buds at home next to the coffee pot.

Getting an iPod is kind of like getting a pet. At first it’s an iPuppy, all adorable and iPerfect. All you want to do is gaze at it, and cuddle it and scratch it behind its cute little USB port. But it’s even better than a pet, because it never eats your wallet or iPiddles on your lap.

Since you love your little iPod, you just naturally want to buy it iPresents. Well, as luck would have it, an entire industry has grown to help you satisfy this urge, and in a lot of stores these days you can find whole aisles full of nothing but iPod accessories.

You can spend $40 on a little canvas jacket with leather trim to protect it from getting scratched and, presumably, from catching the slightest iChill. You can spend anywhere from $50 to $800 on speaker systems with iPod docks built right in, so you can convert the most portable music system the world has ever seen into a living room-bound console stereo. You can pay $30 for a little kickstand that lets you prop your iPod up next to your 44-inch plasma television and watch “Gone With the Wind” on its 2.5-inch (diagonal) screen.

You cannot, to the best of my knowledge, buy your iPod a squeaky toy or a neat little bed to sleep on, although I have heard a rumor that sometime in the second quarter of this year, Apple is planning to release a new product code-named iCot.

So here I am, the happy master of a bounding little iPod. The only problem I have is what to call the little rascal, which is actually something of an ongoing problem for me. Every one of the many animals that have come into my life was rescued, and came with a name, and I never felt really qualified to override fate in these matters. Unlike most men, I don’t even have names for my body parts.

With this in mind (not the body parts thing, but the larger naming issue), I’m announcing the Name Mike’s iPod contest. If you have a suggestion for me, just send it to nametheipod@whativelearnedsofar.com, and I’ll announce the winner in a future column.

Just for the record, I’ve already ruled out “iPoddie.”

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This is Column # MB7. Request permission to publish here.