Oh yes!! I'm the man, I fixed it! Thought about maybe creating my "own" get_instance() system, here's what I did:
class MY_Controller extends MX_Controller
{
public static $instance;
function __construct()
{
self::$instance || self::$instance =& $this;
...
}
}
Then in the library, or in the helper or wherever funky place you need to use it:
$CI =& MY_Controller::$instance;
NOTE that if you autoload a library, MY_Controller::$instance won't work if it's in the library's __construct(), as MY_Controller is not defined yet