Pop-ups making me popping mad

It's a plague of pop-ups: Everywhere I go on the Internet, be it a blog or a link to the headlines of the New York Times, these . . . things pop up and get in the way of what I'm trying to read. Today, I had to close the window of a blog because I couldn't get the the stupid pop-up to close no matter how many times I clicked.

There's such a thing as too much content on a page. Now, every other site has a bar across the bottom with a list of such options as RSS Feed, Twitter, Facebook, etc. Personally, I find it a distracting (not to mention that the fancier your blog is, the longer it takes to open). Call me old-fashioned, but I'd rather just read, thank you.