Putting out the garbage the other night in the rain and freezing weather landed me a cold. Great - just what I needed heading into the long weekend. Serenity now!

Asian stocks closed lower. The Hang Seng was down more than 3% and the Nikkei closed more than 2% lower. Meanwhile, Europe was a bit of a mixed bag earlier this morning. And here in the US, we're currently trading higher.

Here's what has my attention this morning:

Alcoa (AA):
 I don’t know if its stock is going to get crushed on the heels of its first-quarter earnings announcement, but it may be a bit crumpled.

In the period ended March 31, the aluminum giant posted a loss, excluding items, of $0.59 a share. That was a bit steeper than the $0.57-a-share loss that analysts had been figuring on. Meanwhile, revenue came in just north of $4.1 billion - which was actually a bit better than expectations.

Clearly, I’m not happy with the bottom-line miss. I’m also not happy with metal-pricing conditions. However, in the press release, I think the company did try to make lemonade out of lemons. It talked about its liquidity/cost-saving efforts. The specific lines that hit home were:

“During the quarter, the Company launched wide-ranging operational initiatives to reduce costs, increase cash, and improve liquidity. Procurement efficiencies and reduced overhead will eliminate more than $2.4 billion in annual costs by 2010. For the quarter, we generated $293 million in procurement savings and $110 million from overhead reductions.”

I don’t have the jewels to hop in and bottom fish early in the session. But this is one that I'll definitely keep on my radar screen. Note that prior to 9:00 a.m., the shares actually looked as if they may trade a bit higher at the open.

Bed, Bath & Beyond (BBBY):
 The well-known retailer of kitchen gadgets and all things home-related released its fourth-quarter numbers.

The company put up $0.55 a share - well better than the $0.44 the Street had been expecting. To boot, per Reuters: “The company also said it was comfortable with analysts' estimates for the current quarter, and that Wall Street estimates for the full year 'appeared reasonable.' "

From an investment standpoint, I’m not a huge fan right now. I think fickle consumers in this environment and in the near-term could just as easily head to their local Wal-Mart (WMT) or Target (TGT) to pick up that bronze-colored waste-paper basket or stainless-steel tissue-box holder. Also, the estimate I’m seeing for the current year is $1.50. That means it trades at about 17 times that current year estimate - which is a bit hefty.

Long story short, I’m taking a pass, although I think investors are likely to bid the shares up in today’s session.