Leap Year 2024

 

Leap Year 2024

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

Happy New Year!

2024 is a leap year, a year with an extra day to balance the calendar year with the solar or tropical year. An astronomical year lasts slightly less than 365 and one quarter days. Without an adjustment every four years our calendar would soon become out of synchronisation with the tropical year; in four years, it would be out by about one day and in 100 years it would be out by approximately 25 days.

Julius Caesar introduced the leap year in 45 BC. The Julian calendar ruled that any year number divisible by 4 would be a leap year but this resulted in many leap years. Pope Gregory XIII introduced the Gregorian calendar in 1582 to regulate this. The Julian calendar is 13 days behind the Gregorian calendar. It is still used in parts of the Eastern Orthodox Church as well as in Oriental Orthodoxy and by the Berbers in parts of North Africa.

Leap years occur every four years except for years that are divisible by 100 but not 400. 1900 was not a leap year, but 2000 was. For most of us, at least until 2100, if the last two numbers are divisible by 4, the year is a leap year.

The summer Olympics are held every four years, usually in a leap year. The 2020 Olympics were postponed for a year because of Covid. This year, Paris is hosting the summer Olympics from 26^th July to 11^th August. 

The opening ceremony is usually entertaining though sometimes needs to be interpreted by the commentators, as the dance/drama sequences can be quite mystifying. I wonder why, when all the nations of the world can put aside their differences for two weeks to participate, such willingness to cooperate cannot translate to daily life. Of course, the athletes are competing for medals, not attempting to annex other people's lands. The spirit of apparent goodwill does not last. Consider the 1936 Olympics in Germany, which so incensed Hitler. 

What state will our world be in by the summer of 2024?

Leap Day Leap Year

My Leap Day started with me being unable to get out of the shower room. Frodo the Faller, my Velcro dog, had lain down with his back to the door and I couldn’t move him. Obviously, I managed eventually or I would still be in the shower room and not writing this. I mean, I like my laptop but it doesn’t go everywhere with me.

February 29^th doesn’t come around very often, not even every year. No, it has to wait four years before it makes an appearance but it is important. It’s more to be noted and feted than common or garden April 18^th or November 27^th or any other day of the normal or ‘common’ year. February 29^th only shows up in out-of-the-ordinary years, those whose last two digits are divisible by four, but even that formula doesn’t always work. It’s really much more complicated, all to do with solar years and Gregorian calendars. It’s a rough rule of thumb, though. Whoever said there were not enough hours in the day was on to something.

This is the day when confirmed bachelors hide for fear they should receive a marriage proposal. There are fines for refusals – a kiss, £1 or a silk gown. These seem quite arbitrary or are they graded according to the class and expectations of the girl concerned?

Tomorrow is March 1^st, St David’s Day and our daffodils have just come out – they must be WelshJ