Happy Leap Day

[TopNotch]

Happy Leap Day!
In 46 BC, Julius Caesar, after consulting with astronomer Sosigenes of Alexandria, decreed that the calendar should include one extra day every four years. In 1582, Pope Gregory XIII fine tuned the system to omit the extra day in years ending in 00, unless divisible by 400. Currently a year is 365.24219 days, so this system works out fairly well. However, because tidal friction from the moon is gradually slowing down the earth's rotation, leap days will not be needed in about four million yesrs from now.

[GTRS Fiero]

When I was younger, the odd number of dsys in a year bothered me.  After all, how can there be partial days?

Now, the 4 million years bothers me.  Who wants to have to fix the 4,000K bug?  Try using a date 4 million years from now!

[TopNotch]

And if you're wondering why Caesar consulted an astronomer way down in Alexandria instead of Rome, well, that's where Cleopatra lived, and she was his main squeeze until he got himself killed. Then she got herself another Roman, Mark Anthony, and he was defeated by Octavian, and she killed herself with a snake bite. But you can see all that in the movie staring Elizabeth Taylor as Cleopatra. Or the old black-and-white movie staring Claudette Colbert as Cleopatra.

[GTRS Fiero]

Friends, Romans, countrymen, I come not to bury Caesar, but to praise him...

Yeah, I remember Mark Anthony.  Cleopatra was a very interesting character, in her own right.

[montegut]

I wonder if I will have my other, “project Fiero” done by the time we don’t need a leap year?

[GTRS Fiero]

Well, that all depends on motivation.

[scottb]

I wonder if I will have my other, “project Fiero” done by the time we don’t need a leap year?

are they ever done?