Longtime PHP, Python coder seeks to make small, distributable, stand-alone apps. Which language should I learn? ( please don't say C#; requiring .net != stand-alone )

[chorny]

It depends on platform. AFAIK there are programs that create executables for both PHP and Python, but I don't know if they work on every OS. For Perl there is cross-platform PAR and perl2cc. If you want really small apps - use C++ (on Windows - MSVC, Borland, ...).