Larry Wall, the creator of Perl and author of "Programming Perl," delivers a vast collection of wacky metaphors relating to the state of Perl, Perl 6 and the Perl community. While, as Wall puts it, in this annual speech he rambles about things marginally related to all things Perl.

According to Wall, the world of programming can be approached similarly to the taxonomy of plants and animals. Wall hints at existing flaws, quirks and features in a collection of popular programming languages - while treating them as phyla, genera, species of the programming kingdom. But Perl is growing up, and Wall considers Perl as one of his children.

In the context of family, Wall examines the Perl community. Acknowledgement of the contributers to the success of Perl is mixed in with a broad look at Perl as a metaphor of life. However, when all the literary mesh is pulled away, Wall discusses the state of Perl today, the progress made on the way to Perl 6, and how the community is anticipating the future needs of the language.