Re: "reputation of being somewhat of a talented programmer."
I was a (pointy-haired) manager when one of my fellow project managers owned a team where the team leader was a genius. He probably was too.
The whole project was being coded in a language which he had invented, with everything going through a compiler/translator which he had developed and which he maintained, fixing bugs as his team discovered them.
It was forbidden to touch the intermediate code (C, I think it was). All development had to be done in the new language.
Things did not turn out well.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
