I don't remember seeing it in the very long patch notes but it seems that the longstanding bug where it takes 20 sec - 2+ min to pick up some quest items and rare drops now seems to be fixed!
Yay! I can pick up a pandarian treasure without having to remain motionless while wandering mobs beat on me for 2 minutes.
Now, if only they'd fix the thing where I have to click on quest givers 10 times to get their attention.