Does it tend to spark creativity?

I think for exactly this reason.

When I use the fire, is actually when I read.

Because when I'm reading, I'm looking to spark ideas.

What's my takeaway from this?

What's the connection you're making between this thing you're reading here and this idea over there?

That type of connection making is a lot of my brainstorming. I'm creating with the sort of same patterns of cogitation that we would have been using for hundreds of years when people have been thinking professionally.

I also walk a lot.

So I wonder if there's something similar going on.

Like when I'm trying to work through an idea for an article or a math proof or something like this, almost always I'm going to do that on foot.

You don't quite know what you're going to see.

And you also have that circuit quieting effect of the walking to these key networks, which allows you to actually maintain the internal focus on a concept a little bit better. So, I do a lot of my original focused ideating on foot.

But a lot of my serendipitous ideating will be with the fire going.

It's the way I read by the fire.

It's when I read that I get a lot of my original ideas.