I've been a hobbyist Perl programmer for about 10 years now - well, I guess I'm never going to be "fluent", although I'm definitely further along than I was when I started by piecing together parts of different programs I found on the internet.

It's kind of like visiting a foreign country to me - I know how to ask where the bathroom is and can order drinks, but I can't necessarily have an in-depth conversation with the locals. I can also get the gist of a conversation and understand the basic meaning of a sentence through the context of the situation, but without that I would be fairly lost.

I suppose if I had more time, I could become more fluent - but as my survival doesn't depend on me being able to write programs, progress is glacial. The funny thing is, I've tried to learn other languages (briefly), and the only thing that seems to "click" with how I think is Perl, even though I'm definitely not a particularly great Perl user.

I've never worked with programmers either. Honestly, I'd probably be embarrassed to share any of the Perl programs I've written during the last 10 years! It would be exactly like me trying to explain in broken Spanish, or German, that I'd like another beer...