Well we got the anticipated good up day, with the Dow soaring 256 points. Advance/declines were 5 to 1 positive and the volume was good for a change. I dumped the OEX calls for a small loss on the first batch of 15% and a gain on the second batch of 180%. I could have done even better and showed a small profit on the first batch if I had held them longer. But you can always second guess the trades. Already after the market has closed, IBM has reported good earnings and the stock index futures are rallying. However with just 2 days left on the options I decided the risk wasn't worth it and locked in the gains. It was a mistake but you never know it at the time. You've gotta move on. Gold rallied 16% and the XAU jumped over 10 points. ABX, GG and NEM were all up over $2. The volume was good. There's another trade missed as there was a signal for gold a few weeks ago and I didn't follow it. The dollar was weaker today and oil was higher, both helping gold. Also ABX was medium term oversold and I should have picked up on that. It's never an easy game. GE was up 30 cents on good volume. Would have liked to see GE get more involved on a day the market rallies over 250. We could be in a base building mode there. Mentally I'm tired. Did not sleep much and the trading takes its toll, especially these short term attempts during options expiration week. Of course I am disappointed in not holding the OEX calls but what can you do? I think I was somewhat preoccupied with not having a losing trade for the year. Had I timed things better the results would have been stellar. Instead it's a matter of going on from here. I suppose I could have remembered that sometimes there is the positive bias for expiration week. I chose to limit the risk. There will be other trades down the road I suppose. We'll see where we end up tomorrow.