> Yes, sometimes Perl looks like line noise to the uninitiated, but to the seasoned Perl programmer, it looks like checksummed line noise with a mission in life.

edit: formatting

Learning Perl

http://shop.oreilly.com/product/0636920018452.do

I don't think it matters that much what you start with unless you have something in particular in mind you want to do, in which case, no matter what it is, choose Perl :)