Lower again today as the Dow fell 157 points on average volume.  The advance/declines were negative but not as much as a down 150 market would suggest.  The overall market was stronger than the Dow.  Hence I'll repeat what I said yesterday.  I do not think that this is the beginning of something big to the downside.  The summation index is still moving up.  The loss today in Walmart contributed to the downside in the Dow.  The short term technical indicators have started to roll over for the major stock indices.  I got rid of my October SPY puts for a small gain of 40%.  As usual I could have gotten a better price.  With only 2 days to go here in the October option cycle, I decided to just get out with what I could.  I'll be looking at the SPY November calls to purchase now.  GE was off 1/4 and the volume was OK.  Just profit taking here before the earnings on Friday is my guess for what's going on here.  Gold was up almost $20 today on the futures as the economic data came in weak and the Feds beige book had no surprises.  The fact that the dollar dropped helped gold as well.  The XAU added 3 3/4, while GDX gained a point.  Volume was heavy for the gold shares.  Finally some interest in the gold shares as they are overbought and staying that way on the daily charts.  The September/October seasonal strength for gold has shown up late this year.  But here it is.  Can it last?  Perhaps.  We have broken above the highs set in August.  Mentally I'm feeling OK.  I still think that higher prices for equities are coming in the weeks ahead.  We had very high McClellan oscillator readings lately and the summation index is moving up.  I think that the S&P 500 can make it back to the 2050 level before resistance really kicks in.  If we get some more pull back next week, the SPY November calls are in the plan for the next trade.  For now, I'll let the expiration pass on Friday before I do anything else.  Gold appears to have finally gotten some interest.  However there is a lot of resistance at the $1180 to $2000 level for the yellow metal.  There's also a downtrend line at $1225 to deal with.  So I would not get overly bullish there for now.  Most of the major foreign markets were weaker last night.  We'll watch and see if that trend continues tonight.