[Jessica Lares]

I LOVE Alfred and Popclip (I know I'm over the top enthusiastic most of the time around here, but really, I love all the stuff I use, hahaha), both great apps. You should check out Two Dollar Tuesday, I got Popclip during their special.

If you're really into your apps on OS X, I recommend Bartender. It's a bit pricey, but it will help you organize and hide all the junk that a lot of apps leave all over your menubar. A GREAT program. It's not in the App Store though.

Just the stuff I have in my dock, not all in the store:

Espresso - A web editor, really like that you can edit the CSS in real-time and has X-ray, so you can see which elements are causing what issues
Day One - Cool journal app, have it for iOS too
Marked - Markdown previewer which lets me use whatever editor I want to write it with
Evernote - For my notes
Pocket - Save articles for later
Scrivener - GREAT software for writers who want to do everything in one program
Courier - A little program that lets me multi upload stuff to Facebook/Flickr/etc
Favs - Kinda like a reader app, but for stuff you favorite on social sites
Firetask - Project/task management

CloudApp is great for getting stuff quickly uploaded too, and I use Living Earth for displaying current weather conditions on my menu. It has a beautiful interface too.

As for how I keep up with releases? Well, MacRumors is my preferred Apple related site. A lot of developers post around those parts, and that's actually where I saw Kris that makes Marvin for the iPad first post it about it. 9to5Mac, Cult of Mac, Macgasm and RazorianFly are also all very good.

MacUpdate is pretty good too. They catalog just about every piece of Mac software ever made and give you links where to get them, whether it be in the Mac App Store or on the developer's website.