MySQL 5.1.59 Commiunity keeps restarting on access (no replies)

I'm having this intermittent problem where when I try to access databases in MySQL instance either via the command line or via a tool phpMyAdmin, the server will momentarily disappear and I'll see the following in the logs where it looks like the server is restarting. It happens on every access. And then just as mysteriously goes away sometimes.

Any ideas?

120515 10:30:53 mysqld_safe mysqld restarted
120515 10:30:54 [Warning] '--skip-locking' is deprecated and will be removed in a future release. Please use '--skip-external-locking' instead.
120515 10:30:54 [Warning] option 'sort_buffer_size': unsigned value 64 adjusted to 32776
120515 10:30:54 [Warning] option 'read_buffer_size': unsigned value 256 adjusted to 8200
120515 10:30:54 [Warning] option 'read_rnd_buffer_size': unsigned value 256 adjusted to 8200
120515 10:30:54 [Warning] option 'net_buffer_length': unsigned value 2 adjusted to 1024
120515 10:30:54 [Warning] option 'thread_stack': unsigned value 64 adjusted to 131072
120515 10:30:54 [Note] Plugin 'FEDERATED' is disabled.
120515 10:30:54 InnoDB: Initializing buffer pool, size = 8.0M
120515 10:30:54 InnoDB: Completed initialization of buffer pool
120515 10:30:54 InnoDB: Started; log sequence number 13 3418581327
120515 10:30:54 [Note] Event Scheduler: Loaded 0 events
120515 10:30:54 [Note] /usr/local/mysql/bin/mysqld: ready for connections.
Version: '5.1.59' socket: '/var/mysql/mysql.sock' port: 3306 MySQL Community Server (GPL)