Whassamatter, there, Slim-- still iPodless due to lack of available funds while everyone around you is basking in shiny white-and-steel musical bliss? Or maybe you want to get an iPod for a friend or loved one this holiday season, but your "giving mood" isn't quite up to the $299 level of giving. Okay, while this isn't another way to scam a free iPod, it is a method to get one at half-price-- and unlike most of our previously-reported freebie deals (which required you to, say, buy a motorcycle or get nominated for an Oscar), this particular offer comes with absolutely no strings attached!

Well, okay, maybe one string: it's a "classic" 5 GB iPod, i.e. the one with the spinny wheel instead of the new trackpad-sporting models. (Personally, we prefer the wheel, but we also prefer "Fish" to "Barney Miller," so you can't always go by us. Viva Abe Vigoda!) Oh, and, uh, there's another string, here: when we say "half-price," we mean half of the original price-- meaning, $199 instead of the $399 we paid for our own spinny-wheel iPods. But hey, two strings? That's pretty good, considering.

Hey, wouldja look at that? Another string! (Man, they're sneaky little buggers, ain't they?) This particular iPod offer is for a "refurbished" model, meaning it's probably a returned unit that's been factory-reconditioned according to the requirements of Apple's "Stringent Refurbishment Process" to be, if not actually new, then mostly new. Of course, that doesn't change the fact that there's a slim chance that, before Apple restored it to a state of pristine Almost Newness™, any reconditioned iPod you buy was originally owned by some scary deviant who used it in bizarre naked escapades involving a tub full of grape jelly and a ritual animal sacrifice. Hence the reduced price.

Still, if you're pretty comfortable with all that, cruise on over to the Apple Store and you'll find the $199 refurbished iPods in the Special Deals section. Seriously, if $299's just out of your league, in our opinion $199 (and the occasional naked grape jelly nightmare) is well worth the life-changing experience of carrying over two full days' worth of music around in your pocket. We are the 'Pod People; be one of us. One of us. One of us...