This whole "buy the dips" nonsense is in its fifth month of working well for the bulls. Painful, ain't it? It seems that on the rare instances the bears get a respite – – like just a few days ago, on Monday – – it's a "one-hit wonder".

The real risk, I think, is if the market can click above the highs seen earlier this month. We are not far away from them at all, and some of the major patterns that have formed are pretty bullish. Let's take SSO, the ultralong ETF, as an example:

If we break above 31.94, the recent high, that's going to be quite bullish for the market in general. And let's take a look at the even more potent FAS, whose recent high is also marked:

One doesn't have to squint real hard to see that these are good, solid bullish patterns. I have held my nose and start acquiring "lottery longs" again, to try to ameliorate the mountain of shorts that I have.

So, for me, Monday was awesome, and Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday have been rather un-awesome. I know we're in OPEX week, but I don't think the trading world is turned on its head every few weeks. In other words, "that's no excuse."

The funny thing (well, not ha-ha funny, but ouch-funny) is that I used to hold up mid-March to mid-May 2008 as the oh-so-awful, gosh-I-hope-I-never-endure-such-a-thing-again time period. But these five five months make that prior timespan look like remedial kindergarten. The past five months easily "out-brutal" last Spring, so shame on me for even mentioning it, since the trading gods thought they'd have some fun.

Anyway, I think I'm done for the day. I'm a lot less chatty, as you've noticed, on up days versus down days. It's the nature of Slope. Good night!

I have avoided trading UNG for a while, but they might want to change its symbol to UGH. It can't seem to find a bottom, even in this giddy, bullish, buy-everything-at-any-price environment we're in.

About my only short "behaving itself" today is PGF, which is down over 5%. Any ideas as to why?