title: SQL Server: Most optimal way of storing time (without date)
body: <p>Here's one more or less for perfection's sake.</p>
  
  <p>Microsoft SQL Server only contains the field type <code>datetime</code> for storing dates and times.</p>
  
  <p>But let's say that I want to store a list of business hours, where the date is completely irrelevant. Currently I'm using the <code>datetime</code> type and then simply displaying the time-portion of the data. But I have two problems with this.</p>
  
  <ol>
  <li>It seems awkwardly inefficient.</li>
  <li>It may confuse future developers to see a full-blown date coming along with the time, which they may not know whether is used anywhere or not.</li>
  </ol>
  
  <p>And so it begs the question; in the absence of a specific <code>time</code> field (like in MySQL), what is the most optimal way of storing only a particular time of day, from 00:00 to 23:59?</p>
  
  <p><strong>UPDATE</strong>: It's SQL Server 2005. (Also I'd just be interested in knowing what to do in general when there is no <code>time</code> type.)</p>