KEY POINTS:
That's it my world Cup postings are over... it's the final done and dusted... and quite frankly the only thing of interest to me in the final was that South Africa won - to shut the commentators from up north from rapping on about how southern hemisphere rugby is too fickle, too superficial.
I've spent the last two days having goodbye drinks with the people I worked with over the seven weeks including the TV3 crew which is ironic considering the injunction against my company over this World Cup.
But at the end of the day all us of Kiwis over here just got on with it, did our jobs, enjoyed the culture and had one jolly heck of a time.
There is some gossip from the sidelines. For instance, Mike Catt said to a referee when asked "do you have illegal padding on underneath your jersey", "look at these (doing the bicep pump) do I look like I need padding?" What did John O'Neil say about the English again?
Then there was the talk about a prominent Welsh player. The full story might get me in trouble, but it's about his love life. Leave it at that aye.
Gay was popular in the rugby circles, Nigel Owens the Welsh ref came out of the closet a few years back, plus he's a stand up comedian. But don't worry it's just like cheerleaders and rugby players - a no go. Unless you're Doug Howlett who ended up falling in love with a former cheerleader. Good on him! By the way it's amazing that the Wallaby player that was with Howlett at the time of his boozy night didn't get in trouble.
There was the New Zealand tour group leader that got his drink spiked and robbed in the quiet ski resort of Chamonix.
The Samoan rugby team had some dissatisfaction under the surface too. My source tells me it was the old school style of the coaching staff that some of the professional players didn't react well to. These days players get a big say and that is not how it went for Samoa.
There were one or two teams that hit the booze hard in Paris while the tournament was running. You'll know who they are because they are the sides that didn't perform up to expectation.
Not Ireland however, the opposite for them. They were too serious, too convinced they had the talent, and in the end, too uptight to let loose. I was going to interview Brian O'Driscoll after their game against Argentina, I was in contact with him and had arranged to ring him. But after finding out that he was, shall we say, not a happy boy when interviewed by a New Zealand film crew the week before, I decided it would be better to just let him be.
Dan Carter's mum and dad were on one of the tour groups I was involved with in the last two weeks, they too flying over already in the knowledge they weren't to watch their son play. I hear he rang them to apologise... obviously distraught would not properly describe how he was feeling at the time.
The IRB party was Sunday night in Paris, just five of the English team and a similarly small group from the winning SA side too were there. It seems these awards evenings are more for the administrators than anyone else.
But as for scandals it seems the only one for us was the lack of our presence in the semis.
I'm sick of talking about the whys of our failure. We lost. We will win other times. And the world keeps going round, and the people continue to talk. Let's just hope it's not negative, more positive. And that continual analysis is not too damaging to the physc of our rugby boys.
