Where is your Idea Notepad?

Graphic designer John Maeda photographs anything interesting he comes across. Jackie Chan keeps a small notebook in his pocket everywhere he goes. Zig Ziglar recommended putting pen and paper at bedside to capture those sudden dreamy inspirations. Microsoft has - after half a dozen Windows releases - finally thrown in sidebar Notes for Vista. Sivin Kit carries around post-it notes (first guy I've seen who does it).

Good ideas come and go. Naturally, they tend to go faster if we don't store them effectively when they come.

More importantly, ideas tend to disappear really quick when we don't recognise the need to capture them for future recall i.e. we don't even want to note it down.

Unfortunately, we can't control the timing of Eureka moments. If you're at office, capturing ideas is easy. But what if you're in the train, in a restaurant, shopping for groceries or taking a walk?

One has to be ready at almost all times (and whilst I think putting a marker pen with water-proof, but self-disappearing, ink in the bathroom is a little overkill, if it helps and your family doesn't mind, why not?).

With the advent of fancy palm-top organisers and Black Berries, this shouldn't be a problem (except I wonder how many use these devices to capture unexpectedly brainy in-comings).

Or, you can do a Jackie Chan and bring notepad and pen everywhere you go.

Easier alternative? Use your mobile's Reminder function. I do.