Leap Day Should Be a Holiday in Idaho

This lovely planet we find ourselves set upon makes a full orbit of the sun every 365.2421988 days. That’s a bit much to keep track of. Humans like to simplify things as much as possible, so we rounded it to 365 days.

How is Leap Day a Thing?

The trouble with rounding is that the extra bit of time at the end can really mess up if you cut it off at 365 forever. Someday, we would be having summer during January if we kept the calendar that way. To keep our calendars on track with the revolution of the little blue marble around the big orange ball, Julius Caesar started the leap day. Now, every 4 years there is an extra day added to use the leftover .2421988 part of the year.

Should Leap Day Become a Holiday?

Now, what to do with that extra day? It isn’t any extra time really, just our calendar catching up with the actual cycle. But that extra day should be a holiday, shouldn’t it? This could be a day to bring all humans on the planet together for one goal. For those who cannot take the day off, they should have the opportunity to have an alternative day off to use.

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What is something special you could do to make a leap day something worthwhile? Any Leapling (people born on February 29th) should get a kickin’ party since they grow older, but only get to party once every 4 years. If you get invited to a leapling birthday, consider yourself lucky.

Take the day to do something you really enjoy, but don’t take the time to do. If you want to nap in your pajamas all day, go for it. Maybe you can try something exciting like asking the person you are interested in out on a date. Go to a restaurant you’ve never been to before. Whatever it is, make it once every 4 years worthy.

Leap Day Doesn't Completely Balance the Calendar

via GIPHY

If you are a math person, .2421988 X 4 = .9687952. This means there’s too much time added to the calendar. But when will they take back the time we’ve overcompensated for? For which we have overcompensated. Sorry, grammar. Once every 128 years, maybe not have the extra day?

What does a captain do on Leap Day? Jumps ship.