Yeah, I find it draining when working too long on the same thing and get distracted. I can (and do) work for long periods of time, but I feel it after and it makes me less efficient overall. I think working for many short bursts throughout the day lets me get a lot more done (and this is how I work on my own projects, eg during weekends: work for 1 to 4 hours (depending on the task), 1-3 hours off, 1-4 hours on etc and at the end of the day, I'll have racked up 5 or 6 hours of good, highly productive, efficient work. If I do 8 hours straight, I'm guessing only about 2 are actually efficient. When I was in uni, I often leave my assignments until the last day (BUT think about them before hand) and then sit down for maybe four blocks of 1.5 hours and get them done in 6 hours of work - compared to people trying to sit down for full days and spending a lot lot longer on them..

I agree - commuting means I'm tired before I even start. (Being a night person means I'm tired when I get up for the day job in the morning too, but thats another matter).

The full day off is important to me, but probably a lot less if I didn't get drained from doing 8 hour days.

PS: forgive my bad comment structure, its Friday, long and busy week, I'm pretty drained right now.. see above..