You can buy stock and sell out of the money calls against them, thus reducing the overall purchase price. The stock can be called away if it rises above the strike price thereby capping the profits. However, you can always roll the options when you near the strike price and expiration. That way, you don't loose the stock when its having a great run. This also works in the specific case of sitting on FB stock from day one and being in a big hole at the moment. Keep selling out of the money calls and having them expire worthless, but keep rolling them to the next month when they get close to expiration.
On a regular trading day (ie no earnings report, no news expected), trading straddles for a short term gain does not make sense to me. The stock has to move more than the price of the 2 legs + commission for you to break even. Feel free to trade straddles on GRPN, FIO, QCOM, AAPL, GOOG, PCLN and other stocks with a history of wild post earning swings. You might get very lucky.
