GDB unable to trace xchat on linux

[mancha1 at hush dot com]

Hello.

I am using GDB 7.5.1 and trying to trace xchat 2.8.8 compiled with
-ggdb and default configure options (see below).

To reproduce:

$ gdb /path/to/xchat
(gdb) r

xchat starts but hangs at "Looking up <insert server used here>".

xchat's faq (http://xchat.org/gdb/) suggests GDB has trouble debugging 
when a server hostname is used. As they suggest, I ran a local ircd and 
used 127.0.0.1. The problem remains.

Any linux GDB gurus out there that can offer some guidance on what the
problem is?

--mancha

PS. When in this hung state, ^C followed by "thread apply all bt" gives
the following stack. Also after SIGINT and quit from GDB in this state,
xchat's window stays open and the process is unkillable. ps x shows it
in state "t".

#0  0xb7fde424 in __kernel_vsyscall ()
#1  0xb7eed8bb in poll () from /lib/libc.so.6
#2  0xb6e481e6 in g_poll () from /usr/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0
#3  0xb6e3a3ad in g_main_context_iterate () from /usr/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0
#4  0xb6e3aaef in g_main_loop_run () from /usr/lib/libglib-2.0.so.0
#5  0xb7b29fcb in gtk_main () from /usr/lib/libgtk-x11-2.0.so.0
#6  0x08060da2 in fe_main () at fe-gtk.c:290
#7  0x080b4904 in main (argc=1, argv=0xbfffef14) at xchat.c:920

PPS. Default configuration on this system:

xchat 2.8.8

Building GTK+ Interface .... : yes
Building TEXT Interface .... : no

PLUGINS: Perl: yes Python: yes TCL: yes

mmx tinting ......... : yes     spelling .............. : libsexy
XShm tinting ........ : no      plugin interface ...... : yes
text backend ........ : pango   nls/gettext ........... : yes
openssl support ..... : yes     ipv6 support .......... : no
dbus support ........ : yes     msproxy ntlm (ISA) .... : no