Read list

I have a daily routine: I open up google reader and skim through sites and blogs to get an idea of what's going on today.
It used to be that there were only news sites, blogs, and nasihat hal-ehwal ugama in my feed. That was thenlah.

As you can see someone's wading into the deep end of the hipster pool.Thanks ddreamer.

Drama fits aside, google reader and my pretentious subscription list actually help a lot in giving ideas for projects.

Arty blogs show you new way of doing things.
Entertainment blogs keep you on the pulse of what's popular at the moment, and a good guide to how to package ideas.
Topical blogs (politics, religion, science, etc.) gives you angles and stories that you can ponder on.

And of course, friends' blogs. Those really save me time.
The more updated they are the less I need to spend time with them to find out what's going on in their lives.

Joke joke.

What sites help your thinking process?

You can't break and enter metaphorical doors

You need access.

Say you see a couple of doors, some colourful, some drab. All else being equal you'd want to go through the colourful doors because, well, they're appealing and look well maintained. Anything well-maintained must be worth walking through.

Thing is, all the doors are locked, and you need someone to open them for you. So we step back a little, and see what the doors open up to. Houses.

You recognise some of them as belonging to your friends, or even a relative. But they don't have colourful doors. That's not where you want to go.

So what do you do?

Very likely shiny things are gold, but there's plenty other more valuable things out there. Like concrete. Don't underestimate the value of well-mixed concrete.

You may not always have the money, or the husband, to get you gold.
Now if it was really that important to you, you wouldn't mind working for it a little. Twist his arm, and make him get you an oven. Use the oven to bake cakes. Sell the cakes, make money. Buy industrial oven, open cake shop, make more money. Then finally, buy a jewelry's store's worth of gold.

We may not have direct access to the things we want, be they projects, contacts, gadgets, but we do have access to people around us. They may not be as glamorous or held as high in esteem as the top-shelf items, but they're there for you to exploi... build upon. Make full use of them or dreams remain dreams.