Apache slow to find localhost -- how can I fix?
A few things:


Apache built into OS X runs on port 80. If XAMPP couldn't start the web server erroring because port 8000 is in use, something is listening on that port already. You did one of the right things in reconfiguring XAMPP's Apache port, the other would be to find what's running on 8000 :).
You're using the "Bonjour" name of your server, in theory. The mysite.local name. But if it's taking more than a second to resolve, then it is obviously browsing out to the internet in order to resolve the name to an address and come back inside.


If you know how, you can take the time to investigate your Bonjour settings. If you have Wide-Area Bonjour Browsing configured, but the server on the other end is not (or is no longer), these lookup delays are not completely impractical.

The quickest fix to this problem would just be to use localhost:8080 instead of mysite.local:8080, the longer one would be to trace where exactly your DNS lookup is heading too, and determining why a multi-second lookup is occurring.