thatnks for the replies.using IE; always have. regularly scan for nasties--know all about that. no toolbars other than google's, and i have the minimum options for even that.
if it were an IE problem, then this would happen on other sites (and i use many). it only happens here, though.
FWIW, i had few problems using my old win98 PC; it's been since resuming winXP that this started.
just now i was looking through closed listings to re-list a similar item; got "page not found" when i wanted to view more than 25 items.
ooookay...so i went to page two. "page not found."
refreshed the page--took me back to page one.
clicked the link for page two.
"page not found."
in all sincerity, i think it's a site-problem--otherwise, as i said, this would be happening w/other sites at various times.
it only happens here. so that "gibberish" is probably a busted "pointer" on the auctiva site, i suspect.