I’m knackered. I spent the past few days writing up a thirteen-page application for a Feasibility Study Grant for the business, and it took a lot out of me, and I’ve Bootboy to write this week as well.

There’s something icky for me about commitment, I realise – especially financial commitment. It has never been my strongpoint. Putting down in print what I’m aiming to spend makes my stomach thud a little. Whether I spend it or not is a different matter, but, truth be told, if this project is going to work, money, and lots of it, will have to be found, and spent again. I’m going to have to go through many more hoops like this to make my plans come to fruition.

It did help to map everything out over the next few months, however, and re-defining the core business idea with a business-minded audience in mind helped clear up some vagueness in my thinking. It’s a strong plan, and I’m proud of it.

If I get the grant, (I’ll hear in 3 weeks or so), there’s going to be a wonderful 2-week trip around Ireland to look forward to. Not a holiday; the next stage is doing my market research, which will have to be face-to-face, and as much about making good first impressions and establishing good business relationships, as it will be about about selling the idea.

In allowing myself to see what sort of features I want in my website, how I imagine it looking, there are some wonderful examples out there. As my del.icio.us links are added to my business feed every day, you can wander through them all yourself if you’re curious, I won’t list them here, but I have to marvel at what Protopage are up to, their design principles take my breath away, their focus on user-friendliness. I covet what they’ve got. And another hats-off: an Irish company, for PXN8, a superb online photo editor.

This project is going especially well at this early stage because my general invitation of a month ago, when I announced to the open space that is the blogo’sphere that I was about to start down the business road, resulted in an angel (there isn’t a better word, really) getting in touch. He’s been offering me exactly the practical financial/managerial advice and support I need, because he thinks it’s going to work.

So, folks, blogging works as a means of connecting people, in a way that I’m really impressed with. If you find yourself needing something, just put it out there and ask. You never know who might answer.