Thanks for all the info.
If I could afford broadband, I'd already have it.
Not an option at this time. I'm about to move into a new house so my expenses are needed for other more important things (like letting my wife turn the damn place into a museum -- ugh).
Actually, what you told me was what I ended up doing after I wrote the original post, I just didn't get to reply until now.
I went through and checked all of my settings. I had changed them once before and everything was cool. Then it all went 'wrong' with the disconnections and poor speeds (even for dial-up)
After tweaking all the settings (I think the upload speeds helped the most - too many taking from me, not enough giving) I now stay at turbocharged throughout the time I have LW on, and my dl speeds range from 2kb-6kb.
Of course, I had to cut down on how many could dl from me and the speeds at which they could do so. But hopefully it'll all even out in the end. I only wanted a couple things anyway. I don't just dl every day.
Thanks for all the help folks!
Oh, by the way.....
I never surf and dl at the same time. That's why I generally don't do a lot of dl'ing. If it's something big, I leave it on auto-pilot over night.