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8:30 AM EST Friday, July 7, 2006: Hedge funds are covering shorts. This means they feel the market has stopped going down, for now. Maybe.

Commodities? Oil is trading $75.65, an all-time (non-inflationary adjusted) high. Gold is trading at $630. It got as high as $722 on May 12. It got as low $550 in recent weeks. It is now about to break through its 50-day moving average on the upside.

My commodities fund was up 26% in 2005. For the first half it's up 6.94%.

Where do commodities go from here? These charts come from an article by David Bassanese in the Australian Financial Review's SmartInvestor magazine. His conclusion: "While an outbreak of exuberance was headed for a correct, huge demand created by growth in China and India means the bull run still has a long way to go." Now, study David's charts. They tell the story. If you want his entire story, click here.

Three more reasons to love Australia: (In addition to those I mentioned last Friday. Click here.)
1. Australia's federal budget is in surplus. This fiscal year (June 2006 to June 2007) will produce a surplus of $AUS10.8 billion, the government's ninth surplus.
2. Australia has paid off its national debt. It has no national debt. That saves its taxpayers $AUS8 billion a year in interest.
3. The latest federal government budget cuts personal taxes by $AUS$36.7 billion over the next four years.

Where viruses and bad stuff comes from: Two places:
1. In attachments to emails. Don't open them unless you're 1000% sure.
2. By visiting shonky web sites. Many of the spam emails you receive -- from eBay, PayPal or the Bank of America, etc. are simply enticements to get you to visit web sites you should not be visiting. When you're there, they load your computer with spyware or Trojan horses -- software which allows a distant computer to take control of your computer for nefarious tasks -- like sending more spam.

If you remember not to open attachments and not to visit "iffy" web sites, you can do away with software like Norton Internet Security, which often slows your computer, sometimes to a standstill.

I hate HP printers and scanners: This is a personal hate. Yours may work fine. But all mine are quirky, frustrating and time-consuming to install -- especially networked ones. I don't want to tell you how much time it took my HP scanner to make this morning's scans. Other printers and scanners I own from Dell, Tektronix (now Xerox) and Dymo work flawlessly.

Wimbledon Tennis is on. The semifinals are today. The finals, this weekend. I'm betting it will be a Federer-Nadal final.

Letters from women Dear Abby admitted she was a loss to answer:
Dear Abby,
A couple of women moved in across the hall from me. One is a middle-aged gym teacher and the other is a social worker in her mid-twenties. These two women go everywhere together and I've never seen a man go into or leave their apartment. Do you think they could be Lebanese?

Dear Abby,
What can I do about all the Sex, Nudity, Fowl Language and Violence on My VCR?

Dear Abby,
I have a man I can't trust. He cheats so much, I'm not even sure the baby I'm carrying is his. What should I do?

Dear Abby,
I am a twenty-three year old liberated woman who has been on the pill for two years. It's getting expensive and I think my boyfriend should share half the cost, but I don't know him well enough to discuss money with him.

Dear Abby,
Our son writes that he is taking Judo. Why would a boy who was raised a Christian turn against his upbringing.

Dear Abby,
I joined the Navy to see the world. I seen it. Now how do I get out?

Dear Abby,
I was married to Bill for three months and I didn't know he drank until one night he came home sober.

Dear Abby,
My mother is mean and short tempered. I think she is going through mental pause.

This column is about my personal search for the perfect investment. I don't give investment advice. For that you have to be registered with regulatory authorities, which I am not. I am a reporter and an investor. I make my daily column -- Monday through Friday -- freely available for three reasons: Writing is good for sorting things out in my brain. Second, the column is research for a book I'm writing called "In Search of the Perfect Investment." Third, I encourage my readers to send me their ideas, concerns and experiences. That way we can all learn together. My email address is . You can't click on my email address. You have to re-type it . This protects me from software scanning the Internet for email addresses to spam. I have no role in choosing the Google ads. Thus I cannot endorse any, though some look mighty interesting. If you click on a link, Google may send me money. Please note I'm not suggesting you do. That money, if there is any, may help pay Claire's law school tuition. Read more about Google AdSense, click here and here.
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