There are less than 20,000 records being searched here, but the query takes several minutes.
I know this may not be enough info, but would one suggest I optimize the query or put my attention towards other areas.
SELECT id,date,headline as head,headline(body,q),rank(vectors,q),timestamp FROM stories,to_tsquery('$query') AS q WHERE vectors @@ q ORDER BY $sort DESC OFFSET $offset LIMIT 20