I’m now a member of the iPod nation. This weekend my wife graciously purchased a colbalt blue iPod mini as a birthday gift.

I resisted getting one for a single reason: everyone was buying them. Kind of like those yellow Lance Armstrong wristbands, I didn’t want to feel like a lemming.

But now that I have one, I wonder, what took me so long? iPods, simply, are brilliant.

Ergonomically, they are unrivaled. It’s a snap to operate with one hand. iTunes could use more development, but I’m a convert to that as well.

One problem, the instruction manual is spartan. I’m a guy that likes to have lengthy, wordy instruction manuals. The manual literally says, install CD, plug in, play. But what happens when the installation is not that easy, as mine was? There is no place to dig in to find more help. I know they are trying to make it seem simple, but sometimes it’s not. And simplicity, while nice, needs to be second place to information when it comes to instruction manuals.

Another problem are the damn ear buds. The music quality in them is better than I expected, but that’s not my issue. If you set your iPod down, the ear buds get tangled up faster than Karl Rove at a grand jury.

I could buy a different set of headphones to take care of the problem. But while I was fighting iPod purchase to begin with (but now love it), I’m now fighting becoming an iPod person. You know what I mean. I own an iPod, but I’m not an iPod person. iPod people accessorize whereas I use mine to listen to mp3s.

OK, I did get one accessory. I picked up an FM transmitter. It’s very small and clips on the top where the headphone jack is. You tune it to a blank FM station and all the music on your iPod will play on your car stereo. Brilliant. Seriously, with this thing there is no reason to use my 10-disc CD changer anymore. Ever.

Apple is now working on a video version of the iPod. It will play music videos as well. We are one step away from an iPod playing TV shows as easy as they play podcasts. Yes, the screen is small (they could probably make it bigger), but if you want to watch something, especially on a plane for example, it’s a perfect solution.

Now, I just have to find me some good podcasts. Suggestions?