This is in 1.8.8 since mb_eregi isn't working, but the code there looks the same in 1.8.9rc1.
The odd thing is that the delay does not occur in phpdigGetUrl, pages are fetched very quickly there from my experiments.
I am wondering if it is a time-out issue in here for some reason.
I don't see it with all sites, but only with some (e.g.
www.dmoz.com)
Using a stream_set_timeout with a 5 second value before that call seems to be helping right at the moment.