Is it possible to get rid of the delay between right-clicking and seeing the context menu? I'm finding that in OS X there's a delay between right clicking and actually seeing the context menu (or whatever I'm trying to get at).

I've never noticed a delay like this in other operating systems. I wonder if it's a 'feature' (or otherwise) of OS X.

It's not a long delay, it's probably ~250ms; enough to cause a little frustration anyway. The machine obviously isn't stressing about it, it seems to just be an arbitrary delay.
Tapping with the trackpad has a delay while the trackpad decides which gesture you are performing. Disabling some gestures will remove this delay in certain cases:


If “Smart zoom” is turned on, then a two-finger tap needs to wait to see if you are performing a two-finger double tap.
If dragging is enabled (“with drag lock” or “without drag lock”), then a one-finger tap needs to wait to see if you are performing a double tap. (This setting hides in the Accessibility preference pane.)