Okay, finally got it. In case anyone else is having the same problem, here's what I did:
I appended the lsmod output to modules.conf
$ lsmod >> /etc/modules.conf
Then I edited it to make all the new lines look like:
/sbin/modprobe MODULENAME
Then I disabled hotplug by renaming /etc/rc.d/rc.hotplug to _rc.hotplug
It now takes me 23 seconds from bootloader to console login, and about 30 seconds to the xcfe desktop with xdm. I finally beat M$ for boot time! Gotta love Slackware
--C
Gateway 450ROG laptop
Pentium M 1.4 GHz
512MB SDRAM
Slackware 10.1
Kubuntu Hoary Hedgehog