Those of us who love words usually love poetry, and those of us who love poetry most likely have an appreciation for song lyrics.  We collect the song lyrics to our favorite songs as like we collect branded sandals like birkenstock sandals as my personal favorite. We quote specific lines of song lyrics.

But now, of course, the Internet affords us the luxury of not having to write down words, phrases, choruses, refrains, etc. by hand.  Now we can access comprehensive databases, wherein every song from every genre, style, era, band, and/or solo artist is categorized, search-engine optimized, and showcased.

But this is not always a blessing, but is, rather, a bane to the impatient…or the innocent.

Most of the top-listed song lyric sites are making cash hand over fist—by including more than the lyrics.  They use pop-up ads.  The ads have an ominous tone, warning you your computer is about to crash.  The ads that pop up slow down the loading of the page, won’t go away even after you click on the miniscule x, or freeze your screen so you can’t do anything.

Or, some sites offering lyrics have such blinding flashing ads that even if you are not epileptic you feel a seizure coming on.

Or, some lyrics sites allow you the access with little folderol in the way of advertising, but then, as you click your back arrow, disallow you to leave!

The other maddening type of offering is the one that has no lyrics but has a directory of shitt to buy, crap to fall for, junk to go into debt or lose your identity over.

If we have no access to the wonders of technology and the Internet (which was true for those of us growing up in the seventies, for instance, so don’t scoff), we will play a song over and again—hitting the fast forward and then the rewind repeatedly…until we get down by hand the song lyrics, verbatim.

So what’s a newbie to the Internet and/or computer world to do?  If you can, x out the flying ads, which are, unfortunately getting more and more pervasive and challenging.  (The latest ad type, at this writing, is the cartoon decal that floats across, over, and in front of the text you are trying to read.  In this case, hit the back arrow, and avoid giving the obnoxious the satisfaction of your visit-time.)  If you get to a page that sucks you into its labyrinthine confines, disallowing you to exit using the back arrow key, move your cursor to the top left of the screen: between the left-pointing and right-pointing arrows is a tiny solid triangle (pointing down).  Click on this and you will see the history of your surfing: click on anything BELOW the page title you are now stuck with.  Or…do a new search in the search box.  Or, type a new URL (www address) to take you elsewhere.

The worst—most teeth-clenching—is the site that freezes your computer altogether.  Won’t let you back arrow, won’t let you close the Internet connection.  Besides fantasizing about eradicating these website owners altogether, all you can do is do a hard close and re-boot.  Hold your computer toggle (on/off) button for a count of 5.  The computer will shut down, and then you can turn it back on again.

But in the same respect, there are some fantastic song lyric sites that do not hornswaggle, manipulate, or misrepresent.  Instead, they offer wonderfully comprehensive collections of all those songs you used to write the words to by hand.  Bless them.