Datepicker (1.8rc3) not transferring date in IE6

Question

Using jquery-1.4.2 and jquery-UI 1.8rc3, I instantiated a datepicker on a text input with showOn: 'focus'. The datepicker appears correctly. However when I click on a date, the datepicker doesn't disappear and the dateStr doesn't get transferred to the text input. I tried adding an onClose: handler that calls alert(dateStr). The event fires but no dateStr has been set. Everything works fine in Firefox. I have Microsoft Script Debugger installed but no script errors were detected.

I did report this as a potential problem at the jQuery UI forums but my message has been sitting there awaiting moderation for hours and I figured someone here might have a suggestion.

$().ready(function() {
$(".date").datepicker({
    showOn: 'focus',
    onClose: function(dateText) {
        alert(dateText);
    }
});
});