What’s the best day of the week to take off if you work a four day, 10-hours-a-day work week? -Jeannie F, Marin County, CAThursday. Trust me, being self-employed I’ve done a lot of experimenting.The ideal 3-day workweek is easy: that’s MWTh — Monday, Wednesday, Thursday. It makes Monday easier, because you know you have the next day off. You arrive Wednesday feeling like it’s Monday, except tomorrow is Thursday, which is Friday for you! Then, every week, you get a three day weekend to cap it off! It’s ideal, and I recommend the MWTh work schedule for everybody.Working a 4-day workweek, especially 4 10-hour days, is more complicated. The entire dynamic changes. The ideal 4-day workweek is MTWF. The best day to take off is Thursday.You have to think in terms of psychology: three 10 hour workdays in a row is easy to handle, it just feels like a heavy-duty, but abbreviated, 3-day workweek. Thursday feels like a taste of early weekend, which puts you in a good mood. And then Friday is a cakewalk because it’s only one day. Then you start your weekend refreshed, because you’re only coming off a single day of work since your last break, you’re not recuperating from 2 or more 10 hour days.What you want to avoid is ever being in a position where you find yourself thinking “Christ, get through today and I still have 2 more days of this” — EXCEPT on Mondays, when that’s ok for several reasons: you’re still refreshed from the weekend, plus on Monday, you’re really used to thinking “Christ, 4 more days in a row of this”, so on Monday nights, only 2 more days seems like a relief, not a burden.Whatever you do, don’t take Monday off. Mondays are never relaxing, whether you’re working or not, so you might as well work. Psychologically, it doesn’t even count as a 3-day weekend if the extra day off is a Monday. Your body will never let you feel like Monday is a weekend day. Mike Kupietz , a reluctant scion of the postmodern age, is larger on the inside than the outside: perhaps not a composer, but a producer and arranger of sounds; nor a writer, but an avid writer-down; an occasional author of doggerel; an erstwhile urban hermit; and privately a man of very great ardor. He is, if now resigned to never succeeding at those personal and artistic pursuits he holds most dear, unwavering in his determination to fail at them as entertainingly as possible. He is currently in what he calls the "red bathrobe period" of his life. If you're wondering what all this has to do with FileMaker development or IT consulting: you done taken the wrong turn, this river don't go to Aintry—Mike's professional services are on his San Francisco FileMaker Pro consulting website. View All PostsPost navigationPrevious Post Why do people respect George Carlin?Next PostUC Berkeley Steam Tunnels Photojournal—Urban Exploration