Search Function and Query Posts Conflict

Hello everyone,

Heres the issue at hand.

ive got a search function at the beginning of the page and later down ive got a query function that basically pulls out the latests posts from a specific category. However when i do a search, it displays all the results in that category for no reason.

But when i remove the query function, the search function works perfectly.

The search code is the default that usually comes with wordpress and the custom display specific category code is as follows:

<?php query_posts('cat=3&showposts=5'); ?>

<ul>
<?php while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>
<li><a href="<?php the_permalink() ?>"><?php the_title(); ?></a></li>
<?php endwhile;?>
</ul>

It seems as if that code needs to be closed somewhere.

Could someone help me figure this out.

Thanks