Flaw or Sign of Things to Come

It's Friday and I have 5 minutes before I have to leave to catch the
train home. Just enought time to transfer last nights Futurama from a
USB thumb drive to the iPod so I can watch it on the ride home, right?

Wrong. My work pc is in a coma that I can't wake it from. So while not
helped by the fine products from Dell and Microsoft, the fact remains
there is but one way to get _my_ content onto an iProduct and that's
via an expensive (trust me, I have just fried one and have looked at
the cost of an official replacement) white, non-standard cable.

Oh, I guess there is also the iTunes store way as well.

So, instead I read a (paper) copy of The New Yorker and left the iPod
and the thumb drive in my bag, together just not speaking to one
another.

Anyone know if there is a way to transfer files from USB media to an
iPod/ iPad so you can play them?