I'm curious what your day job is.
Twitter and tracking keywords = you can just send Twitter an update using track at the beginning of it in order to start tracking, and then setup your IM (my preferred method) or phone (which I think would be crazy) - see
HERE for how to - so in my case Gtalk squalks at me regularly when my selected keywords are mentioned in any Twitter conversation - can be cool way to see news on things real early.
Friendfeed = a pretty slick sort of social / aggregator tool. You plug in as many social / services sort of sites as you like (e.g StumbleUpon, Twitter, Google Reader, del.icio.us, Flickr etc.) and then every time you share something via Reader or tweet something, or make a new blog post etc., it is auto-shared on Friendfeed for you. It also alllows for 'liking' things from others and a flow of conversation on same.
I'll look forward to seeing your blog. I've been using Wordpress for a couple of years and have picked up one or two little useful things - PM me if you ever need any help or that sorta thing ...