Dear Geist,

I am a shiny new MFA who dreams of writing fiction full-time as my main occupation, but meanwhile I need to get a regular job for food and rent. Some of my writing friends say it’s better to get any kind of writing job—ads, tweets, sponsored posts, help screens—to keep my writing muscles limber. Other people say I should do something completely different during the day so I don’t pollute my writer brain by composing crap. Want to weigh in?

—Hardback writer, Grande Prairie AB

Dear Hardback,

You won’t know which type works for you and your writing life until you try them, so go ahead. Any situation can be serendipitous; for example, a lowly-seeming job where your co-workers turn out to be artists and writers like you. Also, marketing copy is not necessarily crap. The jacket copy for your published novel, for example, will be gold. To write for marketing is to compose text with a tight rhetorical focus—a useful skill for any writer. And by the way, we recommend that you install another criterion in applying for day jobs: number of hours per week you must spend to earn a living wage.

— The Editors