Even though I run high on memory, the program completes.

If I run out of memory is it possible that the program will complete and get messed up somehow and cause the probelm I'm seeing?

If the Spreadsheet::ParseExcel::Simple goes out of scope each time in the foreach loop, is the object memory getting destroyed and recreated in each loop?

Edit: Ahh I see that the memory isn't nescessarially deallocated when the object goes out of scope according to some of the links you suggested.