I won't sugarcoat it: The Commerce Department's durable goods report came out this morning, and the news was not good.

Orders for new equipment were down across the board in April. Reuters calls it the "largest decline in six months" and places the blame squarely on autos and aircraft -- singling out Boeing (NYSE: BA) as a primary culprit, for snagging only two new airplane orders in April.

Even the sole silver lining to this gloomy report looks tarnished. In Commerce's entire report, only the computers and electronics industry showed any increase in new orders whatsoever. And even here the "good" news came with a qualification: "Estimates of shipments for the semiconductor industry are no longer shown separately … Estimates and percent changes for new orders and unfilled orders exclude semiconductor industry data." So yes, Intel (Nasdaq: INTC) and Advanced Micro Devices (NYSE: AMD) may be doing well -- and maybe not. We just can't know from this report.

What to do now
Perhaps you're expecting some variant of the old "sell in May and go away" advice? Well, think again. Because while April's news was unabashedly bad, it was just … April's … news! It's nearly a month old, and already looking out of date -- for example, Boeing is already bouncing back in May. By my count, the Seattle plane maker has booked at least 26 orders for new 767s, 777s, and 787s so far this month. Boeing's so confident about the future that it recently upped the production rate on its 777 airliner.

The Foolish view: One month's data does not a rebound make -- but it won't derail the recovery either.