Loosing internet connection randomly

Ok got two main issues here:

1) When I first boot up my Mac, I have to wait about 5 minutes or so before I can get online (I have SBC Yahoo! DSL and a Netgear router, FYI). Like when I first open any app that uses the internet, like Safari, it says "contacting www.URL.com" then after a few seconds I get the lil info window that says it can not find the server. Then after a while I can get on. But even then, at random I just loose the connection again with the same window. Usually when this happens I can only visit my homepage and the site where I lost the connection at. This also happens with Mail. At first I can't access my email (I get the lil "!" by the email addresses), but after a while I can get on. Then at time I may loose the connection, again.

2) After having my Mac for 4 months, I finally did a repair permissions. Prior to it I would click on Mail in the dock and there would be about a 3-5 second delay before the Mail window would appear. Then after the repair permissions, the window came up instantly. I was very pleased. But today, I started up the Mac again, and Mail again has a 3-5 second delay to show the window. It's not really a big deal, but why did it goes much faster when I repaired permissions last night and now it doesn't?

Hope that makes sense. But the first problem is the most annoying one. Thanks for any help and info!


EDIT: Ok this is sorta weird. I restarted my Mac again, because my internet connection wouldn't come back, and now Mail opens up fast again. And last night I did the samething before I repaired permissions. So now I think that the reboot did the trick with Mail rather than repair permissions (Not sure if it helped the internet connection or not). Still quite odd (and annoying). Not sure what to say about that, but just some more FYI.