[gentoo-user] issues with apache config

[James]

I'm a long-time Cherokee user that is switching to Apache due to a
nasty Cherokee bug that I can't seem to work around.

I've configured Apache many times (albeit a long time ago), and can't
seem to figure out what's going on here.

I have a simple PHP app running that lives in some directory, say
/stuff/web/app.

I then have a vhost configuration that looks like this:

<Directory "/stuff/web/app">
        Options Indexes FollowSymLinks
        AllowOverride All
        Order allow,deny
        Allow from all
</Directory>

The vhost looks like this:

<VirtualHost app.server.com:80>
        ServerName app.server.com
        DocumentRoot "/stuff/web/app"
        ErrorLog /var/log/apache2/app.error
</VirtualHost>

When the server reboots, Apache refuses to serve me anything, giving
the following error:

==> error_log <==
[Mon Apr 04 07:17:59 2011] [error] [client 10.35.22.81] client denied
by server configuration: /usr/htdocs

==> access_log <==
10.35.22.81 - - [04/Apr/2011:07:17:59 -0400] "\x16\x03\x01\x01\x98\x01" 403 273

I'm well aware of the default apache configuration (defined in
/etc/apache2/modules.d/00_default_settings.conf), and that the default
directory directive has a "Deny from all" default.

However, if I *restart* my daemon with NO configuration changes after
seeing these errors, the page comes up beautifully. Also worth noting
is that rebooting the server again will put Apache back into a
"broken" state and only after restarting the daemon will things
function correctly.

Thoughts on how to fix this would be much, MUCH appreciated. I am
running out of hair to pull out of my head. :)

-james