It was a very volatile session for the stock indices.  We were down over 100, rallied back up to be positive and then sold off in the final hour once again.  The Dow fell 105 points on light volume.  The advance/declines were almost 3 to 1 negative.  Unless we get some kind of move to the upside tomorrow, the market will collapse.  The conditions for that type of event are present.  We are moving closer to the zero line in the summation index.  The stock indices are oversold and staying that way.  It appears that I will not have a chance to purchase some September OEX puts.  Trading is never easy and very frustrating at times.  But what can you do?  GE was off another 1/8 and the volume was average for summer.  No trades in mind for GE here.  Gold was off a couple of bucks for the futures in the regular session and a few more in the aftermarket.  The US dollar was higher today.  The XAU fell 4 1/2 as the gold shares dropped with the overall market.  Consolidation is in order here.  A significant drop would not help my October ABX calls.  But anything is possible.  ABX off 3/4, GG lost 1 1/2 and NEM shed a buck.  Volume picked up to the downside and that isn't a good sign for the bulls.  If and when the overall market starts to crash, the gold shares will go with it.  Then why not just sell the October ABX calls now?  Because there's also a chance that there will be a huge flight to safety and gold could fill that bill.  Mentally I'm feeling as though I'm about to miss a huge opportunity.  Granted, trading the stock indexes is a lot harder than trading the individual issues.  But the seeds of collapse have been sown so to speak.  I suppose I'm hoping that the powers that be will hold things up until the major players return.  But that looks like wishful thinking at this juncture.  A market that can't rally when oversold is dangerous.  That's where we are at.  Gold itself seems to be holding up here but that isn't helping the gold shares.  The US dollar will rise in a flight to safety as well.  So we could see some crosscurrents in the gold market moving forward.  It will be interesting to be sure but we really only care how to trade and profit from the price movements.  We'll watch how the overseas markets react to todays US developments and take it from there.