One of the best ways to build confidence and experience is to look at some of the questions and solutions that are asked here and in comp.lang.perl.misc, and try to come up with your own.
Part of the reason I (and I suspect btrott and turnstep are similar in this) spend so much time coming up with alternate solutions is because there are so many different ways to do things. It keeps me sharp and helps me find obscure language features and understand more about things I haven't learned yet.
Do that for a couple of months, hack on a few projects of your own (or patch a few free projects), and then you'll know what to put on your resume. Tangential to the original question, but it might help.
