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@@ Leap Day - February 29th, 2000 @@ Are You Ready? Please Link Us to Your Home Page :-) http://www.mystro.com/leap.htm

INDEX Leap Into A Book-It's Leap Year! | "Will we get a Birthday February 29, 2000?" Headlight-Sun Order of 29-ers, World Chapter No. 1' Leap Year Party Ideas | Women who were hoping to marry their Beaus | Leap Year Cocktail

My theme in the media center [of Madison Elementary School] right now is: Leap Into A Book-It's Leap Year! I'm using frogs everywhere. I laminated frogs that have frogs jokes on them. I put them on lily pads all around the school hallways. Lift up the frog to read the answer. Example: How do you get frogs off the back of your car? With a rear defrogger. We've been singing "Ten Green and Speckled Frogs" and "There's A Hole in the Bottom of the Sea" at storytimes. I made cut-outs for the kids to hold while we sing. A big frog on the bulletin board says "Ribbit, Ribbit, Ribbit, Read It." I also told the kids that while frogs like to leap, so do kids in tennis shoes. So we're having a tennis shoe drawing contest. Rules are to draw a tennis shoe, color it, cut it out. I will give prizes for many different categories, best drawing, fanciest, funniest, ugliest, dirtiest, etc. Everyone will get a prize for participation. On Leap Day we will have a RIF distribution. (For those who don't know, RIF is Reading is Fundamental, a government program where all children get three free books during the year.) A teacher is going this weekend to see about renting a frog costume. We also have a second-grader who is a Leap Day Baby. He's going to be our star of the day. His teacher has made a sash to wear that says "Leap Day Baby." His class is going to read frog books that day and use frogs in many different subject areas. It's going to be a fun week for everyone.

B. H.

Madison Elementary School

Davenport, IA

So the question is, "Will we get a Birthday February 29, 2000?"

You get a Birthday if the year is:

divisible by 4 and
is not divisible by 100 unless
it is divisable by 400

1700, 1800, and 1900 were not leap years (divisable by 100, but not 400).

So we conclude that 1600 was a leap year and 2000 is a leap year (400).

For the technical explaination go here to: VMS chooses to treat the year 2000 as a leap year

Or here to theRoyal Greenwich Observatory Information Leaflet No. 48: `Leap Years'

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John Shine wrote "I been in search of an organization known as the 'Headlight-Sun Order of 29-ers, World Chapter No. 1'. This group was started in Pittsburg, Kansas in Feb, 1928.

My mother-in-law was the first charter member, born on 2/29/28. Articles were written for the Pittsburg Headlight and Pittsburg Sun newspapers, featuring leap year babies, every four years until the mid-1960s. I would like to help revive that tradition. Are you aware of this group? Is it still in existence? Any info you have would be greatly appreciated."

Mail John Here

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"It is absolutely imperative that one's birthday be celebrated in the

month one was born." Or that was the argument I used to use when my family

tormented me that may be I shouldn't have presents on the non- Leap Day

years of my birhtday

I vote for Feb 28th

Ginny R.

Leap Year Party Ideas:

We're having a leap day party and we are going to serve.....

(drum roll please)

frog legs!!!!!!

and

hops

and

pita "pockets" (as in kangaroo pockets - hold the kangaroo, please)

and

for dessert... none other than "grasshopper pie"!!!!

:) Marcia M. & Ladner M.

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Remember what Humpty Dumpty said (implied) to Alice (paraphrased and interpreted) - Unbirthdays are more important than Birthdays because you get 364 times as many presents.

For leapday birthdays this is manifoldly magnified.

From a fellow Birthday sufferer

Paul M.

December 31, 1945

Another day that is less often adequately celebrated for completely different reasons.

Bob R. writes:

Thought you'd be interested to know this bit of trivia courtesy of my 86 year old grandma: she informs me, that in the traditional, olden days, when the rules of courtship were stricter than

now, women who were hoping to marry their beaus had to wait for a proposal; they were not allowed to pop the question themselves... except on one day, every four years. Yep, on Feb 29, a young debutante could turn the tables on her man and not have to worry about being frowned upon

by polite society. Pretty nifty, yes?

It is also known as Sadie Hawkins Day, which developed out of the popular cartoon strip "Li' Abner" by Al Capp that ran from 1930's through 1970's. In her article in the Baltimore Sun on Feb 29, 1992, writer Sandra Crokett writes- "a female character name 'Sadie Hawkins' who lived in the fictional town Dogpatch was having a tough time getting a man to propose to her. Her father, the mayor of said fictional town, declared on day, 'Sadie Hawkin's' day. The unmarried women in Dogpatch ran -- literally -- after unmarried men to propose that day."

The tradition started with St. Patrick and St. Bridget (5th Century) in Ireland.

St. Bridget complained to St. Patrick that the sisters in her nunnery were in despair because the prevailing tradition at the time -- that women had to wait for a proposal of marrage from a man. St.Patrick agreed to allow women to propose to men every four years, during

Leap Year. Afterwards, Bridget proposes to Patrick only to be denied!

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Leap Year Cocktail

from www.hotwired.com
If you can divide a year by 400, you can plan on celebrating
leap year in it. Of course, we don't just drink Leap Year
cocktails every four years; 29 February just happens to be the
day we're most at risk of inducing a hangover.

We order Leap Year cocktails anytime a Martini seems a little
too reverent, but our sweet-toothed friends almost always
order them instead, and our pretentious friends go for this drink
the moment we mention one of its key ingredients, Grand
Marnier.

As potent as a Delilah, the Leap Year cocktail is no less of a
drink than a Martini. The drink's just afflicted with a name that
pigeonholes it as the bar special every 29 February.

Never order a Leap Year cocktail by name. Instead, call out
the ingredients: 1 1/2 ounces gin, a 1/2 ounce Grand Marnier, a
1/2 ounce sweet vermouth, and a squeeze of lemon. Shake
with crushed ice and pour into a chilled cocktail glass. We let
bartenders garnish with either a lemon or an orange twist.
(We're researching whether or not their choice of fruit may
signify some deep design.)

It's only after one or two Leap Year cocktails that this amber
potable induces us to adequately discuss what life would be like
without leap year. Would anyone really notice that we "lose" a
day every four years, and that even with leap year, we're still
going to be short three days in 10,000 years?

We're saving our three leap days for a jaunt in each of the
places that stakes a claim to being the birthplace of the Martini:
New York City, San Francisco, and Martinez. On second
thought, maybe we'll take two days in San Francisco.
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