Crazy YouTube behavior

[Oniya]

I've been entertaining myself by listening to lectures and documentaries on YouTube.  My habit is to set the video going, and then occupy my eyes elsewhere (stitching, writing, etc.)  Recently, two very odd things have started happening.

1) I launch a video and it goes immediately to the 'Other Recommendations' screen at the end.  Dragging the time indicator back and forth doesn't seem to fix it, but if I 'threaten' to delete my YouTube cookies (literally, I go to the Tools/Options screen and select 'delete specific cookies' - I don't even get a chance to search for YouTube) the audio starts properly, and I can then drag the time indicator to get the video started.

2) During the hour-plus video, playback will randomly stop, and when I flip back to the tab, it shows that the video has reached the end (XX:XX out of XX:XX) at some timestamp less than the original length of Y:YY:YY.  Selecting the video again will restart it at that random timestamp minus 10-20 seconds.

Any ideas?  O_o

[Oreo]

Any chance you have an ad blocker? I have noticed some stop playing with that turned on.

[Oniya]

I do, but that's been installed for ages (AdBlock Plus extension on Firefox).  This behavior has only started in the past few days.

[Oreo]

Mine worked fine for a long time too. I only noticed it recently. Though I have an old version of Firefox. Some sites don't work at all anymore, like PhotoBucket. Does it do the same thing on different browsers?

[Oniya]

To be honest, the only other browser I have on this box is IE - and I avoid using that like the plague.  Firefox is up-to-date, since I have it on auto-update.

[Oreo]

I only use IE when the phone company forces me to. <_<

I installed Chrome as an alternative measure for Gmail glitches and using PhotoBucket. I am a die hard FireFox lover, but haven't upgraded because I like my older apps that haven't caught up with the new version. I'd be interested to know if YouTube works properly on another browser.

[Sarena]

I have Adblock Plus on Chrome.  Youtube and Photobucket both seem to be working just fine.

[Oniya]

After one more instance of 'threatening' to do it (and the video starting), I ended up just going and deleting all my YouTube cookies.  So far, so good.

[Formless]

The second phenomenon happens to me on a regular basis ... But I thought it's because I use Explorer.

I'm not a tech so I can't really figure it out. I just work around it.

[Oniya]

Well, so far purging the cookies seems to have worked.  I don't remember the menus and buttons for IE, but there should be a way to delete individual cookies (look for a 'Privacy' setting and then search for anything that says 'youtube').  Deleting all cookies would work as well, but it's a bit of a heavy-handed approach if only one site is giving you a problem.

[Formless]

I usually hit refresh. I just wish I can convince myself to use different browsers.

But thank you for the advise. :)