Why go with a private tutor? Have you looked in to taking some Perl classes at a community college? It cost me a whopping $26.00 for one semester of Perl.

There were two classes: beginning and advanced Perl. We had a class size of 30 or so, which diwndled to about 28 at the end of the first class, and about 15-20 in the second class. I'd say that's a better bet than the tutor, plus reading on here of course. :)

There is no emoticon for what I'm feeling now.