THE i-POD

One day a woman came home to find her husband in the kitchen, shaking frantically with what looked like a wire running from his waist to the electric coffeepot he had in his hand. It seemed that he was being electrocuted. So - intending to jolt him away from the deadly current - she whacked him with a plank that had been left by the back door, breaking his arm in two places.

She later she found out that - up until that moment - he had been happily listening to his iPod.

iPods are the newest craze in music appreciation.

(show iPod on overhead)

Launched by Apple Computers in 2001 the iPod is a personal entertainment center. It measures only about 2 1/2 inches wide by 4 inches tall – and is about a half-inch thick. But in this little box you can store your entire musical library and play any song on demand. What used to be stored on hundreds of CDs, and LPs... or 8-tracks now can be carried in your shirt pocket.

And you can listen to this music just about anywhere.

You can keep it in your pocket and run the music to your ears via little earplugs

OR you can adapt it to run thru your car sound system.

OR you can buy a devise that will play your music thru a full scale sound system.

It is truly a marvelous music machine.

But wait – there’s more!

In the latest iPods, you can store and play several movies or TV shows.

Or, you can play games, or you can surf the internet.

With the proper knowledge and software, you can even turn this iPod into

• a cell phone

• a tazor

• or an etch-I-sketch

Now, all this entertainment doesn’t come cheap.

There are several different models on the market right now.

The cheapest runs around $150, but the more advanced models can cost between $400 and $500 depending upon the amount of memory you want.

As you can imagine, I won’t be buying one of these anytime soon but if I really wanted this little item... if I wanted the satisfaction this box promises... that’s what it’s going to cost!

(From a sermon by Jeff Strite, "i-Surrender")