The irrational exuberance of the market in October with the European financial situation acting as the sword of Damocles dangling overhead is just that: irrational.
There are a couple things I would have done differently:
1. The NFLX puts I bought in April with an October 2011 expiration, I would have kept through the August swoon. Though I made 300% on them, hanging on through the debacle of splitting the streaming from disc delivery services, the instantiation and subsequent near-immediate "do-over" call of Quickster, would have netted me a lot more.
2. I would have waited a bit longer buying the puts for next spring, in order to get a better price. For the record, I am holding puts on QQQ for Nov 2011, GLD in March, CELG for April and WFM for May.
Though I think a long drop is in store, I am long a number of speculative stocks (LDK, BTX, SNMX, SRZ), and am mostly in cash. Of the stocks I am holding, I sold the calls on one, and am waiting for additional drops to add to more of the others. Looking at their ticker symbols, I guess I like the ones with X and Z in them.
We'll see how I do.