Well that's that done for another year, but was it all any good?

Thousands of shows to choose from, all of which come highly recommended from someone very important; venues that are HOTTER THAN THE SUN; the odd cheeky sighting of Arthur's Seat, which you'll definitely do this year; horrendous dietary regime; comics narrowly avoiding/surviving nervous breakdowns – but was it all any good?

It has to be a resounding, if qualified, yes! There are plenty of reasons to be cheerful. The free festivals and the Five Pound Fringe worked their arses off in pre-season training to ensure a strong performance, putting on plenty of comedy for a cheap buck. Take, THAT recession - pow!

There was a particularly strong showing from sketch and character comedy this year, with everyone from Pappy's Fun Club and Idiots of Ants at the Pleasance to Beta Males' Picnic and Delete the Banjax on the free fringe lavishing us with fun times. Inbetween them, Adam Riches, Kiosk of Champions, Nick Mohammed, Tommy and the Weeks, Superclump and a bunch of others all made us very happy. Kaboom!

Let's talk numbers. According to the Fringe Society, it was a record-breaking year, with 1.85m tickets sold – a 9% increase on the previous record set in 2007. Bam!

We won the Ashes - thwack!

Unlike last year, the weather wasn't wall-to-wall dogshit. Neither was the box office. Zap!

Awards went to people who deserved it (and that's not always the case) – Lewis Schaffer and Tim Key in particular, take a bow. Victories for mischief and dreamy escapism respectively. Sock!

Sweaty

It wasn't all fairy cakes and skipping in fields though. There was some under-achieving going on among the big hitters. Simon Amstell, Stephen K Amos, Rhod Gilbert, Sarah Millican, Andrew Maxwell, Rhys Darby and Reginald D Hunter were launching fireworks from damp ground. The middle-hitters seemed to fare better, notably Dan Antopolski, Tim Key, Alun Cochrane, Tom Basden, Laura Solon, Idiots of Ants, Glenn Wool and Shappi Khorsandi.

The Edinburgh Comedy Festival (a breakaway festival-within-a-festival tying together the four biggest venues) loomed with intent, still driving something of an unnecessary wedge between the haves and have nots, although it was noticably without a sponsor and not a visible force this year. Should they just pack it in? Will there be a big push next year?

Heat in the venues – it's like complaining about the Iraq war, ie pretty tedious now, but still valid. The smaller Pleasance rooms were particularly sweaty.

There have been accusations of sexism aplenty this year, largely triggered by the female-less Edinburgh Comedy Award shortlists. Sarah Millican played that down here, but the Indy was unhappy with the sexist manner of jokes and a heated debate about The Fix's Fringe coverage can be seen here.

So plenty to chew on, what were your thoughts on this year's Edinburgh? Vent your delight or despair towards paul@londonisfunny.com and if we're not sick of Edinburgh by that point, we'll publish some of the comments.

See you next year!