Leap Year

Barbara Marks of Ellicott City asks: "Has there ever been a blue moon in February?" Depends on your definition. The modern "blue moon" is the second full moon in any month. But since the lunar cycle takes at least 29.2 days, not even a leap year February has room for two. In 1999, February had no full moon at all. An older definition is the third full moon in a season with four. That occurs in seven out of 19 years, always in February, May, August or November.

Glenn S. Segal braced for it, and he got it right on schedule."Happy Birthday, Mr. Segal. We're older than you are," chanted his sixth-graders yesterday at Dumbarton Middle School when he walked into his classroom, which had been decked out with cards, presents and "Happy Birthday, Big 8" chalked across the blackboard.As one of the nearly 10,000 leap year babies born in the United States on the quadrennial Feb. 29, Mr. Segal said he enjoys the jokes that seem to be the fate of people like himself.

JIUJIANG, China -- On New Year's Day, the Zhang family plastered red good-luck banners above their doorway, wishing for health, wealth and a good harvest in 1995. Now, the rain-smeared characters hover just above the water line in their flooded village -- testament to a run of bad luck.Mrs. Zhang looks at the flood waters -- reportedly the highest this century -- and shakes her head. "It's because of 'ren ba yue,' you know -- double August. This is an unlucky year."It's a lunar leap year in China, when an extra month is added to the lunar calendar to make it match the 365-day solar calendar.

In the twilight of the holiday gift-buying season, a familiar emotion sets in among the ringing of sleigh bells and the comforting aroma of cookies baking: panic. Pure, unadulterated panic. And that is why Julius Caesar invented the calendar as we know it.A calendar is the ultimate easy gift, made easier by the calendar stores that have been popping up in malls. A calendar, however, is not a lazy gift, because it takes a lot of work to find the right one. There are thousands of subjects available, ranging from the standby "Far Side" cartoons to meditations from the pope.

There never seems to be enough hours in the day.We rush the children off to school, hurry through work and then zip off to the improvement association meeting, the Cub Scout Blue and Gold Banquet, or head over to the mall to explain to errant shoppers that white shoes should be worn only after Memorial Day.OK, so maybe some of us have more free time than others.But thanks to leap year we get not just a few extra minutes or an hour, but an entire day! And on a weekend!So what do we do this Saturday with this precious gift from the Hallmark calendar people?

Letters, calls and the roar of the crowd:Keith B. Levy, Severna Park: I have subscribed to The Sun for several years and each month I am billed $12.95 for the privilege.In January, which has 31 days, it is $12.95.In September, which has only 30 days, it is $12.95.Last February, which had only 28 days, it was $12.95.I don't have a problem with that and, when you write an especially good column, I even try to pay the bill on time.However, I just received my bill for this February and the bill contains a surcharge of 25 cents because it is a Leap Year.

Listen up, all you shy, love-sick folks of the female persuasion, today is leap day.You know. Sadie Hawkins Day when it's OK to take the initiative and ask for the hand of that man you adore. We know, we know. It's really OK for you flirtatious women to pop the question any day of the year. It's equally OK for all you manly guys to be on the receiving end of the marriage proposal.Or as an advocate of women's rights put it: "We've come a long way since Sadie Hawkins ran out of Dogpatch," said Pat Riviere, a Maryland legislative representative for the National Organization for Women.

We would like to say, "Happy Birthday!" to those who finally get to celebrate their birthday on their real birth date -- Feb. 29!And this year, it's on a Saturday, so you can celebrate all weekend to make up for the last four years. Have a nice weekend!Did you know that leap year, according to folklore, is the year that women get to pursue and propose marriage to a man? If you've beenwaiting for the past four years for your man to pop the question, take advantage of this leap year. Ask him now -- he may surprise you.*Belle Grove Elementary news: Congratulations to the students who were honored at a party Friday for achieving more than 100 points in the Math Super Stars program: Katie Chearney, Heather Clemmons, Kayla Cservek, Kevin Ebersole, Amanda LaBella, Jason Lhamon, Roger McGhee, Steven Moore, Charles Potts, Michael Renes and Shannon Whitmore.

For the Cunninghams of Severna Park, today is twice as nice.There's Janet Cunningham, born on Feb. 29, 1960, who is celebrating her birthday today. Daughter Erin Michelle Cunningham, born Feb. 29, 1988, is also celebrating her birthday. Janet Cunningham is a leap baby who had a leap baby."I guess this would make me 8 years old," Mrs. Cunningham said.Erin Michelle, her mother said, "knows, but she doesn't really understand." When Erin Michelle is asked what birthday this is, she responds, "one leap year."

ANNAPOLIS -- How bad have state employees had it? So bad that even the calendar has conspired against them.First they were denied a pay raise. Then, because of ever-increasing budget deficits, they were stripped of automatic incremental raises and required to pay more for their health insurance. To top it off, the governor ordered those employees who were working 35 1/2 hours a week to work 40 hours a week with no increase in pay.Now they have to cope with -- of all things -- leap year.When Maryland employees opened their paychecks Wednesday, they discovered their take-home pay had actually gone down -- by about $1.05 for every $10,000 earned.

As reported March 2, 1988, in The Howard Sun: Marian Sleeper has a special birthday party every four years. None of her friends ever forgets it. She's one of those chosen few who just happened to be born Feb. 29 - a leap year birthday baby. The 36-year-old mother of three and part owner of an outdoors supply store, Patapsco Outfitters on U.S. 40, officially celebrated her ninth birthday Monday. Actually, 25 people celebrated her birthday with a party Saturday at her Sykesville home.

Shannon Radebaugh went into labor Thursday, but not in time to deliver her baby girl until midnight had passed. "I was hoping at first that it was not going to be a Leap Year baby," she said yesterday as she nursed daughter Heidi in their room at Mercy Medical Center. "I guess the big thing is, when do we celebrate her birthday?" By the afternoon, however, Mom was seeing things a little differently. "She knew she was destined to be a star," Radebaugh said. "She wanted to come into this world with a bang."

Annapolis Mayor Ellen O. Moyer got us thinking about that extra day in the calendar during leap year - that would be today - and the possibility of breaking free from the constraints of daily life. The mayor urged Annapolitans to reflect on the gift of an extra 24 hours and not waste it. Consider taking another 10 minutes for lunch, she said. But why be stingy? If we've got an extra day, let's take it. Why not make leap day an official holiday? Heck, it only comes once every four years.

February arrives at midnight. It's a leap year, so the month will have 29 days this year. The daylight hours are slowly lengthening, and average high temperatures at BWI rise a bit, from 42 tomorrow to 48 by month's end. Overnight lows climb from 24 to 29. The records range from 83 (Feb. 25, 1930) to minus 7 (Feb. 9, 1934 and Feb. 10, 1899). Five of Baltimore's 10 biggest snowstorms have struck between Feb. 11 and Feb. 19.

Barbara Marks of Ellicott City asks: "Has there ever been a blue moon in February?" Depends on your definition. The modern "blue moon" is the second full moon in any month. But since the lunar cycle takes at least 29.2 days, not even a leap year February has room for two. In 1999, February had no full moon at all. An older definition is the third full moon in a season with four. That occurs in seven out of 19 years, always in February, May, August or November.

Victoria Brownworth wrote here last week, "Magical is how critics have described Gilbert and Sullivan's comic opera The Pirates of Penzance. Act 1 opens on leap day 1897 with Frederic, an indentured young pirate, turning 21 and thus free from his indenturing. But as the plot progresses (with some of the most hilarious lyrics in the history of musical theater), it becomes known that Frederic, a leaper, has actually passed only five birthdays and a little more, and thus he must desert his love, Mabel, whom he asks to wait for him (neither seeming to have actually calculated the 60-odd years it will take for him to celebrate the remaining 16 birthdays)

As the birth of his first child approached, city police Detective T.C. McGowan watched the calendar and puzzled through the consequences of what would happen if his daughter was born Feb. 29. That date rolls around once every four years, during leap years. So would that mean birthdays only once every fourth year? Would the law prohibit her from driving until she is 64, drinking until she is 84? Even as an overprotective father, McGowan thought that would be a bit too much. But then his wife, Mindy, gave birth to tiny, blue-eyed, brown-haired Kalie McGowan at 8:44 a.m. yesterday, on the dreaded leap day. While she was in labor at Greater Baltimore Medical Center, she told her husband that she had a plan for dealing with the birthday quandary.

It's not some New Age metaphor or Taoist riddle. We all learned the rhyme in elementary school -- it was one of those catchy little ditties like "I before E, except after C, or when sounding like A, as in neighbor and weigh." Thirty days hath September, April, June and November. All the rest have thirty-one, though February's underdone with twenty-eight -- hold the line! Leap Year makes it twenty-nine. Thus, as with any other astronomical anomaly, like Halley's Comet or a solar eclipse, this very day -- leap day -- won't come again for another four years.

For many of us, it's just an occasional odd blip on the calendar, an extra day of winter, another icy brick on the long road to spring. The reason for today, Feb. 29, also known as Leap Day, is simple: It keeps the calendar in line with the actual passage of time. Instead of adding one-quarter day every year to keep up with Earth's orbit around the sun, we add a full day every fourth year. The scientists say that over time, it ensures that we avoid June snowstorms. But for some, Leap Day is more than mere science.

What difference does a day make? Tomorrow - Feb. 29, which comes only once every four years - people have a bonus 24 hours in which to shop, to work and to earn interest, weaving a tangled web of upsides and hidden downsides. Leap year will likely send an extra $20 million in sales and personal income tax into Maryland's coffers, though what state agencies will have to spend is anyone's guess. Baltimore County government alone calculates the bill for a 366th day at $2.6 million. If it's a typical day, the nation's gross domestic product will rise by $30 billion.