I like to run thru some scales as part of my warm up, which means I end up spending at least some time on them every day. A few times a week I will focus on them just sit unplugged to do finger exercises & scales, even if it's just a 15 minute effort.

Whether I'm about to do lessons or weedle (tm) to the jam tracks or work on the solos in a few songs I am playing with, I aways spend some time warming up with scales & licks. It gets me in the mood and loosens me up. I have a loose approach where I tend toward usually an hour or so of lesson time each week day, then on weekends, I will tend to not do lessons and just use what I gotten so far.

For learning the notes, I used to read the newspaper when taking a break, but now I write out scales, major notes, consider the different patterns, etc. Slowly the actual note-words of the positions I play are beginning to stick. Though my awareness of world events is suffering.

Weedle - (Not to be confused with 'wheedle') To weedle - to play single notes rapidly upon a guitar producing a string of sounds as in 'weedledledledle'. You may use this term freely. :)