Yep ... all that happened is you filled your internet cache
emptying it and rebooting solves the problem (empty ALL your temp files while you are at it, Im betting it has not been done for a while.
I have repaired computers for years, and this "problem" is all too common. I've seen people about to buy a new machine because of it.
Here is a tip for ANYBODY reading this:
Set your
Internet Options >> Temporary Internet Files >> Settings >> amount of disk space
to 10 (TEN) MB - not nine, not 11, not 150, but TEN
You'll find that Windows can manage it's cache quite nicely at this amount (BTW ... 10MB is huge for a simple cache file), and that will reduce the frequency of (if not completely solve) this issue
Would anybody benefit from/like if I were to add weekly tips such as this?