We bounced around today but the Dow finished with a gain of 41 points on very light volume.  The advance/declines were positive.  It is a wait and see market now with the turmoil in Iraq.  We have moved to short term oversold though, so some upside is probable.  Plus we are moving into option expiration week.  I do not expect any big moves though because the summer seems to have come early this year.  If there are no new fighting outbreaks in Iraq over the weekend we should be higher on Monday.  The opposite if there are.  GE  was up a nickel and the volume was very light.  A wait and see attitude here as well.  Gold added a couple of bucks on the futures in the aftermarket.  The US dollar was a touch higher.  The XAU was up another 1/2.  ABX, GG and NEM all had fractional gains to top off a good week.  The volume in ABX was good, average for the other two.  The gold shares have now broken their near term downtrend lines.  The next technical expectation is to snap back toward those lines.  That will be the chance to purchase some gold share calls if you are so inclined.  That is probably when I will get some October gold share calls.  That is the plan for now.  It is possible that gold will simply rally from here but we are almost at the $1280 level and that should provide some pretty good resistance.  Mentally I'm doing OK.  So is this the beginning of a significant decline for the stock indices?  It's unclear for me at the moment.  We do not have any negative divergences that I can see yet.  I think we need to build some sort of top before we see a decent decline.  Perhaps the summer will provide the necessary time.  That's all a guess as usual.  The markets will go where thay want.  We have finally seen some interest in the gold shares.  If it is simply Iraq related, the rally probably won't last.  It is something to keep an eye on.  On the plus side there has been no mention of the gold shares or gold in the media.  So what has happened there lately is under the radar.  That is a positive going forward.  The upside seasonal time for gold is in August and September.  I will be trying to get some kind of position before then.  Despite already having some losing trades in ABX this year, I am not ready to abandon the idea that there is money to be made there.  I could be wrong.  It's Friday afternoon and the official start to summer is only a week away.  I'll be checking the charts as usual over the weekend.  Time for a break.