Things for which writing's inadvertantly good

After my sojourn in That Fancy London last week, I'd been writing pretty much non-stop ever since. Well, not actually non-stop, otherwise I'd have keeled over from lack of sleep, food and other essentials for life. But most of my waking hours have been occupied by writing or thinking about sundry writing projects. Wrote till after midnight on Saturday, put in another six hours yesterday and it's a full programme of writing in the week ahead.

Still, all this writing does have some side benefits. If you're hunched over the computer, there's not much time left in the day to spend money. Online shopping is all too easy, but a really pressing deadline does concentrate the mind away from the lures of retailers like Amazon and excellent New Zealand music outlet Marbecks. So you can save money by writing more. Given the right project, you can even earn money by writing - or so the story goes.

Another advantage of writing too much: you don't have to go outside. Now in summer that can be a bummer. Everybody else is glorying in the sunshine, while you're stuck inside typing. [Get a laptop and wi-fi. Or a pen and paper.] But come the cruel months of winter, not going out keeps you warmer. It snowed overnight here, just a dusting but enough to keep temperatures sub-zero for the third day in a row. Happily, I can stay in and write.

There are plenty of disadvantages in being a writer - lack of human contact, lack of exercise, tendency to get stuck in your own head - so it's nice to know this vocation has some ancillary upsides. [Unless you're Beckley, in which it's just a job.] What other ways can you think of in which writing's inadvertantly good for you?