Tom - Thanks for describing what you do. I am constantly evolving variant trading strategies, and incorporating bits and pieces of each into a larger whole which seems to work for me. I want something I can use on any time frame. I'm always looking to plagiarize. It's so much easier than paying the dues to learn the hard way. I trade QQQ intraday, with the occasional opportunistic NYSE swing trade which pops up from overnight scans. I hope to graduate to trading NQ. I presume you are trading DELL, ORCL, CSCO, MSFT, or INTC for the better volatility? If so, I keep a screen up of those just to see what's influencing the QQQ, but don't trade them. You and I are kindred spirits if you worship Mark Douglas. Saying his name is like saying "Amen, brother!" to me. Re rules, yes it's hard to make them and stick to them. I started out by writing them down, realized they constituted a set of fuzzy logic rules, and flowcharted them. That helps me to stick to them. As an example, the first decision diamond is "Is there a minor or no gap?". If yes, I'm allowed to trade until 9:40. If no, I can't trade until after 10:30. A technique I use to stick to Douglas' principles is to make tape watching a meditation. I focus on price, carefully monitoring my thoughts to catch those devilish beliefs and banish them, like "That 1M block will kill the move", "the gap will close", "38 will hold", etc. On every one minute bar I keep a running commentary to stay focussed: "made a low, first high above the 5ma, 5ma turned, closed above the 10ma, first high above the 15ma" etc. Also I use nominal rather than price in the candles to keep the clutter from bad fills down. I'd be interested to hear from you what your tricks are. Can't pay, of course! You have an SI handle? - Mike