[TxMt] Bash takes a core on 'Filter Through Command'

I've been running awk and sort commands on text files via 'Filter Through Command' for months, on an Intel MacBook Pro, with OSX 10.5 and the current version of TextMate. This week, following an install of TexLive 2008 (it's the only significant system change I can recall, but may not be related), when I try to run an awk command (e.g. awk '{ print $2 }'), bash takes and keeps a full core of the Core2 Duo CPU, and from what I can see it can only be stopped by a ForceQuit. I suspect that there's a simple way to debug and resolve this -- can anyone help me with this?

Thanks in advance -

G -- Gordon Robertson Canada's Michael Smith Genome Sciences Centre Vancouver BC Canada