Yes it is today LEAP YEAR DAY.Congratulations to those celebrating their birthday today. Do you have the birthday in the off years before or after ? - after I presume as it hasn't arrived on the 28th.
We observe the modern leap year because Earth orbits the sun every 365.242 days—not an easy number for a calendar to accommodate.
The last Ptolemaic ruler, Cleopatra, was at least indirectly responsible for introducing the concept to her visiting lover, Julius Caesar.
So in 46 B.C., Julius instituted a single year some 445 days long—later known as the Year of Confusion—to correct years of drift in one fell swoop and prepare for the start of a reformed calendar.
That so-called Julian calendar reorganised the 12 Roman months into a 365-day year with a leap year every four years. It was a tremendous improvement—but with a lingering flaw.
The extra quarter of a day that the leap year added was slightly longer than the 0.242 of a day in the actual solar year.
This seemingly small difference made the solar year about 11 minutes too long, resulting in an entire day of discrepancy every 128 years.
Because of this glitch, the Julian calendar had drifted ten days by the late 16th century.
Pope Gregory XIII introduced his Gregorian calendar in 1582, which determined that only a Century divisible by 400 not 4 would in future be a leap year. So while the years 2000 and 2400 are leap years, 2100, 2200, and 2300 are not.
Not much else to say, except as usual Winston has jumped off the deep end calling the reporters 'jerks' but then again he probably has a point as he has denied NZ First have received money from Owen Glenn but the media are still pursuing it. It would be different if it was a major issue like our Doctor friend who TV 1 have tracked down in Australia.
As for the Drudge Report revealing that Prince Harry is serving in Afghanistan - words fail me. I am for freedom but sometimes common sense has to prevail and what have they achieved. Pathetic.
I see that the big Blues - Crusaders clash is on Anzac Day.
BREAKING NEWS Just listening to the radio and Breaking News is that Nai Yin Xue, 53, wanted for questioning about the murder of his wife Anan Liu, in Auckland as well as him abandoning his daughter in Australia, has been arrested in the US. He was recognised by locals after the TV show 'Americas Most Wanted' featured him recently . Seems the locals grabbed and tied him up until US police arrived. Great news as I thought he might have just disappeared in the 300 million plus Americans.
