When trying to open any workbenches (workbench, arcane enchanter, alchemy lab, etc.), it jumps to third-person view as if it's going to run the animation, but the character just sits there for a couple seconds and then it exits back to first-person.

This worked until today, and now I can't build anything at all. With my smithing skill maxed and enchanting skill well on its way, this is painful...

So it was working and now it's not? If you go back to a previous save does it work?

If this happens in my game I'm going to be royally ticked.

Older saves are okay. Bugged game state being persisted in saves--the most worrisome category of bug in an RPG...

I have the same problem. Maxed my smithing and got enchanting to 86 before this happaned to me. One thing I did notice is before it happened. I saw a item with no name in the enchanting menu so don't know if this happaned to u to.

I know when I'm enchanting, if I zoom in to first person (tends to do it on its own since I mouse scroll) and then exit, it freezes on first person for about 30 seconds. Won't let me do anything. I had to learn to stay in third person the whole time.