It’s a Leap Day Today! (Feb 29th, 2008)
February 29, 2008
7:39 am
Praveen
General
Hardly ever, a day goes by when I don’t wish that there was an extra hour or two everyday so that I can make ‘watching a movie’ or ‘reading books’ as part of my daily routine. When I realized today was a leap day, my heart, well, ‘leapt’ with joy. An entire 24 hours was extra just for me to do anything I please! But then it dawned upon me, that it’s a Friday today, and it’s gonna be just like any other day. Gotta attend classes! For a few minutes, I was indignant over the injustice of having a leap day. Then logic and common sense kicked in. Leap Day doesn’t actually mean more time, it’s just another day at the office for all of us!
So why do we have leap years then? Some say that the dudes at the early centuries who designed our calendars didn’t want to complicate things by adding 5 hours, 49 minutes and 12 seconds every December 31st and so they rounded off the amount of time it takes for our planet to revolve around that big ball of fire to 365 days, when in reality it takes closer to 365-1/4. Instead they decided to take that extra quarter day and store them somewhere in the faraway lands for 3 consecutive years and release them all at the 4th year, precisely at the end of February!
But still, those astronomers weren’t satisfied. There was a still a bit of error pending. So, they decided upon a couple of rules to decide whether a year is a leap year or not:
1. Every year divisible by 4 is a leap year.
2. But every year divisible by 100 is NOT a leap year unless it is also divisible by 400.
This means that year 1800, 1900, 2100 etc. are NOT leap years. And so, Mr. Morarji Desai, the former Prime Minister of India who was born on Feb 29th 1896 happened to celebrate his next birthday only on Feb 29th 1904, EIGHT years later! What a pity! Yes, it’s said that luck chases Leaplings (People born on Feb 29th) and it was true in the case of the Hon’ble Minister…
I think enough trivia for now! Officially, it’s a leap day today! So treasure it and use the day well! Because, the next lucky day as this is still 4 years away!!!
Happy Leap Day!!!
Hari :
Date: February 29, 2008 @ 6:42 pm
Ha, Only after reading your post i realized today is 29th feb. Who watches the date n cares about leap year wen we are in holiday. All boring days n just im adding up today.
Sundar :
Date: February 29, 2008 @ 8:39 pm
This is my second comment in as many minutes for this post. The first’ll be removed keeping in mind that it might affect the sentiments of a lot of the human race.
So, Leap days dont mean a thing da.
Its another extra day you have to get up doing your usual daily boring stuff.
Praveen :
Date: February 29, 2008 @ 9:40 pm
Ya, I guess, probably its good for a company to get an extra day of “essentially unpaid work” out of the employees to make up for all the official government holidays we are having these days!
marudham :
Date: February 29, 2008 @ 11:29 pm
very interesting, very nicely told. keep posting, praveen.
Praveen :
Date: March 1, 2008 @ 11:05 am
@Marudham - Ya, sure! Will keep posting interesting stuffs!
Prashant :
Date: March 2, 2008 @ 9:59 pm
Its Just Another Day!!! Nothing Special On tat Day.. Got a Treat from my classmate who celebrated his Bday which falls on This unusual Day..