Quote from slapshot:
What I don't understand about gold is:
If, according to the gold bugs, we should all buy tons of gold to protect ourselves from failing paper currency - why do they accept this same paper currency to sell us their gold?
Shouldn't they be keeping it all themselves? 
Oh, it must be because they want to help us and not themselves. Silly me.
Gold closed Friday basically $1227, the first time Gold hit that level was 12/3/09, at that time the Euro traded against the Dollar @ 1.5150...... Today 1.2122.
Friday's Gold close based in Euro's 1012. December 3rd 2009, 810 about 20%
Like everything traded, Gold prices do not follow a straight line, you sell when it's high and buy when it's low.
Question to ask, if you had to hold your money long term, would you want it in the form of paper, or something tangible. Gold is looked upon worldwide as something valuable. Governments, Central Banks all hold it. Paper money and more easily moving zero's via bank wire is preferred over hauling a few thousand kilos of metal, but the paper/fiat paperless notation has no value other than the value we give it, in reality it doesn't exist. When you write a check, your bank doesn't haul that paper money over to the bank of the check holder???? It's just moved with key strokes.
Now go back one more year, late October 2008, 10/24/08. Gold was $680, EUR/USD @ 1.2500 Gold in Euros $545.. you do the math and figure out where the value of paper is going.
Gold.......... it's pretty!