I'm not sure if this is in the vein of your question but I was reading this the other day:
"If you have the __END__ token in your program, Perl stops reading source code at that point but leaves the file open. You can read subsequent lines from the file from the DATA filehandle OR you can seek() back on that file to the start of your program's source code. seek(DATA, 0, 0); Self-aware programs. Not self-modifying, though." Quote from : http://prometheus.frii.com/~gnat/yapc/2000-stages/index.html
HTH
jg
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Think a race on a horse on a ball with a fish! TG