A mixed bag to close out the week as the Dow shed 38 points on very light volume.  The advance/declines were negative.  The small stocks were up on the session and that's bullish going forward.  The summation index continues to rise.  All signs are still pointing to higher prices for stocks despite the overbought condition on the indices.  I'm still over leveraged and holding on to the September OEX puts.  Four weeks remaining for this trade and I've decided to give it another week.  Unfortunately, the major players are still out until Labor day.  This trade is showing a decent loss at the moment.  GE was off 1/4 on light volume.  One day doesn't make a trend.  However there is a possibility that GE is rolling over here.  That would bode well for the September OEX put trades that I have.  The September GE puts that I own are pretty good losers.  Gold was up about five bucks on the futures and made it back to $1280.  It is on the precipice of major trouble though if this level is severely breached.  The US dollar was higher today as well.  The trend is clearly up for the greenback.  The XAU was off 1/4.  ABX, GG and NEM all dropped 1/4 on light volume.  These shares are still in their consolidation channels but at the bottom of them.  Next week could be the key and all signals appear to point to lower prices.  My October ABX calls have lost half of their value.  Mentally I'm feeling OK.  One more week of summer and then I would expect volume to perk up along with volatility.  But who knows?  The past couple of years has seen the beginning of September with nice gains for the stock indexes.  Perhaps it will be three years in a row.  I've decided my course of action and it is to be positioned for a decline.  It appears that this OEX put idea will either make or break my trading year.  No one trade should determine that but it is what it is.  The market will go where it wants.  Overbought, staying there and very light volume any way you slice it.  Gold is oversold as are the gold shares but not completely.  I've commented at length on the favorable seasonal time period for gold.  We are now in it and haven't seen any kind of sustained upside for gold.  There is still time for that to happen but it certainly is late.  As usual I'll be checking the charts out over the weekend.  My thinking right now is that next week will be more of the same.  Quiet, summer like trading with a bias to the upside.  But anything can happen in this game.  For now it's Friday afternoon and time for a break.