The Joomla 1.6 JCategories :: get () method creates "PHP Fatal error: Allowed memory outed" in the MVC custom component

I am implementing a custom MVC component after the Joomla 1.6 documentation .

I am having a problem when trying to use JCategories::get()to get a list of categories and their children from com_component. I get the following error:

PHP Fatal error:  Allowed memory size of 134217728 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 125306881 bytes)

If I do not issue print_r($this->items);to list the elements, I do not receive an error message. If I changed the line

$categories = JCategories::getInstance('Content');

to read

$categories = JCategories::getInstance('banners');

I do not get an error.

I have included all my component code below. Like FYI, I spent the last couple of days at irc.freenode.net/#joomla talking with anyone who wants to help with very little progress. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Controller Code:

  <?php
  // No direct access to this file
  defined('_JEXEC') or die('Restricted access');

  // import joomla controller library
  jimport('joomla.application.component.controller');

  $controller = JController::getInstance('CtItem');
  $controller->execute(JRequest::getCmd('task'));
  $controller->redirect();

Model Code:

<?php
// No direct access to this file
defined('_JEXEC') or die;

// import Joomla Categories library
jimport( 'joomla.application.categories' );

class CtItemModelCtItem extends JModel
{

    private $_items = null;

    private $_parent = null;

    public function getItems($recursive = false)
    {
        $categories = JCategories::getInstance('Content');
        $this->_parent = $categories->get(15);
        if(is_object($this->_parent))
        {
            $this->_items = $this->_parent->getChildren($recursive);
        }
        else
        {
            $this->_items = false;
        }

        return $this->_items;
    }

}

View code:

<?php
// No direct access to this file
defined('_JEXEC') or die('Restricted access');

// import Joomla view library
jimport('joomla.application.component.view');

class CtItemViewCtItem extends JView
{

    // Overwriting JView display method
    function display($tpl = null) 
    {

        // Assign data to the view
        $this->items = $this->get('Items');

        if(count($errors = $this->get('Errors'))) 
        {
            JError::raiseError(500, implode('<br />', $errors));

            return false;
        }

        // Display the view
        parent::display($tpl);

    }

}

Template Code:

<?php
// No direct access to this file
defined('_JEXEC') or die('Restricted access');
$document = JFactory::getDocument();
?>

<div id="Test"><?=print_r($this->items, true)?></div>