Three steps to take now to ensure you enjoy all that free time in retirement

When you quit working, every day becomes a vacation day. How will you find fulfillment then?

In their book "Don't Retire, Rewire!" Rick Miners and Jeri Sedlar, professional transition coaches, offer three ideas on how to prepare for all the free time that opens up when you leave work behind.

Seek Alternatives

One way to start planning for that moment, Miners and Sedlar say, is to assess the extent to which your business and pleasure activities overlap. One of the first things people realize when they retire is how much their leisure was blended with work. Business entertaining and travel often meet people's needs for fun and recreation, as do company picnics and other company functions. You'll have to find ways to replace business-sponsored leisure when you retire.

Identify Your Passions

Another way to think about how you're going to use your obligation-free days when you quit working is to analyze your leisure activities now. Use a two-week timeframe to take a holistic view of your life, including things that don't come up often in your schedule and that might become the basis of something you'd like to expand on in your rewired

DEARBORN, Mich. (AP) -- Despite a surprise profit of $100 million for the first quarter, Ford Motor Co. said Thursday that it still expects to lose money this year as the U.S. auto market deteriorates.

But the company's stock surged nearly 12 percent as CEO Alan Mulally reiterated his promise that restructuring will return Ford to black ink for 2009.

The profit, Ford's first since the second quarter of last year, came even during a time when concerns about the U.S. economy kept many car buyers away from showrooms. Ford sales were off about 9 percent for the quarter, and the trend away from trucks and sport utility vehicles accelerated, hurting its bottom line.

Yet Ford said it earned money anyway because of strong profits in Europe and South America, manufacturing cost reductions and successful hedging on commodity price increases.

"The underlying business is improving," Mulally said in a conference call with industry analysts and reporters. "We remain cautiously optimistic despite the external difficulties."

But the question that has dogged Ford for years remains: Does the company, which lost $2.7 billion last year and mortgaged its assets to stay in business, have time to finish restructuring before it runs out of

SEATTLE (AP) -- Microsoft Corp. said Thursday its fiscal third-quarter profit fell 11 percent from a year earlier, when the software maker reported more than $1 billion in deferred revenue tied to delays in the launch of the Windows Vista operating system.

The earnings report didn't affect the software maker's stance on its bid to buy Web portal Yahoo Inc.

In a conference call, Chief Financial Officer Chris Liddell broke from the standard discussion of results to say Microsoft is prepared to go hostile or walk away from its offer if Yahoo doesn't agree to a deal by this weekend.

Microsoft said its net profit for the three months ended March 31 fell to $4.39 billion, or 47 cents per share, from $4.93 billion, or 50 cents per share, in the same period last year.

The results still beat Wall Street's expectations. Analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial forecast a profit of 44 cents per share.

But investors, chewing over the company's guidance and a drop in sales in the divisions that produce