Taking the leap

It’s the gift that comes every four years – leap year.

Instead of the month of February having 28 days, people get to look forward to an added 29th day.

There are a lot of numerical reasons that make a leap year so special.

A normal Gregorian calendar year has 365 days. The year 2016 has to have 366 days to keep the modern calendar synced up with Earth’s orbit around the sun.

Basically, if we didn’t add one more day every four years, the world would lose approximately six hours off every calendar year.

This is the reason why February, the shortest month of the year, gets one day added to it.

Three criteria

According to timeanddate.com, there are criteria that make a year into a leap year.

• The year can be evenly divided by four.

• If the year can be evenly divided by 100, it is not a leap year, unless the year is also evenly divisible by 400. Then, it is a leap year.

This means in the Gregorian calendar, the years 2000 and 2400 are leap years, while 1800, 1900, 2100, 2200, 2300 and 2500 are not leap years.

Born on Leap Day

That’s a whole lot of mumbo jumbo of numbers. Let’s make this a little more relatable. Do you know somebody who was born on a leap year? I do. My aunt has the honor of having a Feb. 29 birthday.

People born on leap years sometimes get the nicknames of “leaplings,” “leapers” or “leap-year babies.”

Some people celebrate their birthdays on Feb. 28. Others might celebrate it on March 1. Then, there are the sticklers who only celebrate their birthdays every four years. Where’s the fun in that?

Think of it like this. By the time my aunt had physically gotten to the age of 40, she had technically only had 10 actual birthdays.

This means leaplings have a Leap Day age and a real age.

As a person who has an Aug. 31 birthday, the shortened month of February affects me, too. I have no half-birthday because there is no Feb. 31. This also means people born Aug. 29 have half-birthdays every four years.

Fun facts

If you happen to be a “leapling,” don’t despair. You’re in a unique club.

After a careful search of the World Wide Web, here’s a few fun facts about people born on leap year.

• There are about 187,000 people in the United States and 4 million people in the world who were born on Leap Day.

• Actor Dennis Farina, rapper Ja Rule, actor Antonio Sabato Jr., singer Dinah Shore and MTV reality star/AIDS activist Pedro Zamora were born on Leap Day.

• Frogs are associated with leap years. Get it? The leap-frog!

• Hugh Hefner opened his first Playboy Club Feb. 29, 1960. Perhaps frogs and bunnies go well together.

• In Greece, people believe it’s bad luck to get married in a leap year. However, in Ireland, it’s good luck to for a woman to propose to a man on Leap Day.

That proposal story actually goes back to the fifth century with the well-known St. Patrick listening to complaints of women having to wait too long for their men to propose. Thus, he decreed a special day where women can take the initiative.

Gentleman, if you are dragging your feet with putting a ring on your girlfriend’s finger, watch out. She may just do the work for you.

Make it count

Even though Feb. 29 may only come around every four years, it has shown to be a special day.

If you’re getting engaged or finally having the chance to celebrate your real birthday, make it a big, special occasion.

You won’t get the chance again for another 1,461 days.