mariadb / mysqld - Got an error reading communication packets

I did an apt-get to update packages (ssl related) and I started getting these errors with mariadb:

Sep 23 07:56:44 user: host: 'localhost' (Got an error reading communication packets)

Start-Date: 2016-09-23 07:08:41

Commandline: apt-get dist-upgrade

Upgrade: libssl1.0.0:amd64 (1.0.1f-1ubuntu2.19, 1.0.1f-1ubuntu2.20), python3.4:amd64 (3.4.3-1ubuntu1~14.04.3, 3.4.3-1ubuntu1~14.04.4), python3.4-minimal:amd64 (3.4.3-1ubuntu1~14.04.3, 3.4.3-1ubuntu1~14.04.4), libpython3.4-stdlib:amd64 (3.4.3-1ubuntu1~14.04.3, 3.4.3-1ubuntu1~14.04.4), libpython3.4-minimal:amd64 (3.4.3-1ubuntu1~14.04.3, 3.4.3-1ubuntu1~14.04.4), libssl-dev:amd64 (1.0.1f-1ubuntu2.19, 1.0.1f-1ubuntu2.20), libssl-doc:amd64 (1.0.1f-1ubuntu2.19, 1.0.1f-1ubuntu2.20), openssl:amd64 (1.0.1f-1ubuntu2.19, 1.0.1f-1ubuntu2.20), linux-libc-dev:amd64 (3.13.0-95.142, 3.13.0-96.143)

End-Date: 2016-09-23 07:08:48

I'm not sure if it is just coincidental or if the upgraded package(s) are affecting mariadb+apache2.

I tried google to figure out solutions to this error, but am having no luck with my.cnf tweaks.

Any ideas?