I've got a four day weekend thanks to the Thanksgiving holiday here in the United States. After reading Jazz in the Bittersweet Blues of Life, and reading of the kind of schedule Wynton Marsalis' father, Ellis kept in order to feed his family and teach the next generation of musicians, it has invigorated me to maximize my time, even during vacations. I mean, most folks think I do a lot between my job, serving in ministry, and helping in the SQL Server community. However, I can look at huge gaps of time that I effectively waste because I don't have a purpose for that time. Now don't get me wrong. I'm not the type who believes in planning every 15 minute block of time in one's life. I've tried that. It doesn't work for me. But I do believe in knowing what you intend to do each day, with having a stand by list of things you would do if you can get to them. That's why tools like Remember the Milk are great, because they can help with this. And so it's not so much a detailed task with an allocated amount of time to each task that I'm putting together here. Rather, a more high level list of what I want to spend my time doing. So here is what I definitely want to do:

Thursday

• Cook a Thanksgiving lunch/dinner with the boys and my wife. We're not doing the traditional turkey. We're going to focus on things the boys can actually a major part of. It's not the turkey that counts, or even the ham. It's the time and the love that matters. - Personal/Family
• Do some goalkeeper work with my oldest. It has been a few weeks. The weather is supposed to be awesome. And he really wants to be a goalkeeper. Enough said. - Personal/Family
• Write an article for SSC. Yeah, I need to. I've got a desire to write a bunch of articles on DMOs. I need to get one of them finished.  - Professional/Community
• Play some flute. Need to really work on my chops.  - Personal/Brian
• Dig out my trumpet and start getting it back into playing shape.  - Personal/Brian
• Finish one of the Polkinghorne books I have checked out.  - Ministry/Brian
• Finalize Sunday night discipleship training for the junior high youth.  - Ministry/Youth

Friday

• Write an article for MSSQLTips. I need to write three more by the end of the year. I'd like to have 'em all done by the end of November. I also plan on getting one written tonight.  - Professional/Community
• Spend time with the kids at one of the parks. I'm thinking picnic. That sounds nice. Again, weather is supposed to be beautiful.  - Personal/Family
• Spend time with the kids doing some electronics learning.  - Personal/Family
• Spend time with the kids playing Memoir '44.  - Personal/Family
• Play some flute.  - Personal/Brian
• Finish cleaning up the trumpet.  - Personal/Brian

Saturday

• Finish prep on Sunday school lesson for Sunday morning.  - Ministry/Youth
• Play some flute.  - Personal/Brian
• Time with the family doing something. We'll play this by ear. Zoo. Congaree National Park. Something fun. We'll decide when we get up and get going.  - Personal/Family
• Work on first certification exam. I want to earn an MCT and maybe teach Microsoft classes part time. Need an MCITP for this.  - Professional/Certification
• Finish re-reading A Brief History of Time. It's been a long time. It's no longer fresh in my mind. I need to refrsh.  - Personal/Brian

Sunday

• Church. This takes up all day. And there's always a multitude of things to do. So this day will look light. But it's not.  - Ministry/Youth
• Play some flute.  - Personal/Brian

And there you have it. If I can accomplish more, that's fine. But that's the way I'm looking at focusing each day.