I answered Python->C->Javascript, but I'll pretend I was invited anyway. :) Python because I enjoy it the most -- if I had to be stuck with a single language, Python would be it. Even if it doesn't run the fastest, its library set and readable syntax make it very endearing to me. I picked C next because it's the obvious choice for speed and systems programming. The fact that you can write libraries for use in many other languages in C is also very appealing. Finally, knowing Javascript lets you contribute to the web. It's a great scripting language that I think gets a lot of flack from people that had to use it in the days before great toolkits like jQuery. While I'd like a choice in front-end scripting languages as much as the next guy, I've come to appreciate JS for what it is.

I've chosen C, Python and Lisp: because those aren't languages, but mindsets, that allow freedom of thought and expression.

I am a hobbyist, so I am free to discard anything, that The Man wants to see in a resume. Hence I've never really got into Java (a nice language, turned into the Cobol of our generation -- to all people writting Enterprise: Java's blood is on YOUR hands!) or C++ (if C is a scalpel, then C++ is a chainsaw... while you're drunk... with someone preaching protected attributes and virtual destructors in Fran Drescher's voice).

But C has inherent beauty to it, expressed in terse verses of absolute and utter control.

Python structures my thoughts.

And Lisp is all that is and ever will be.

Amen.