#! perl -slw
use strict;
use HTML::Entities;

my $data = '<p><b><i>AT&amp;T &lt;grin></i></b></p>';

$data = HTML::Entities::encode( $data ) for 1 .. rand( 10 );

my @saved = $data;
my $l1 = length $data;
{
    my $l2 = length( $data = HTML::Entities::decode( $data ) );
    if( $l2 < $l1 ) {
        push @saved, $data;
        $l1 = $l2;
        redo;
    }
}

$data = $saved[-2];
print $data;
__END__
P:\test>junk2
<p><b><i>AT&amp;T &lt;grin></i></b></p>

P:\test>junk2
<p><b><i>AT&amp;T &lt;grin></i></b></p>

P:\test>junk2
<p><b><i>AT&amp;T &lt;grin></i></b></p>