29 February.....leap year

2008 is a leap year, which means that it has 366 days instead of the usual 365 days that an ordinary year has. An extra day is added in a leap year—February 29—which is called an intercalary day or a leap day.

How leap year came into picture ??? A quick search on the net reveals this :-

Leap years are added to the calendar to keep it working properly. The 365 days of the annual calendar are meant to match up with the solar year. A solar year is the time it takes the Earth to complete its orbit around the Sun—about one year. But the actual time it takes for the Earth to travel around the Sun is in fact a little longer than that—about 365¼ days (365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 46 seconds, to be precise). So the calendar and the solar year don't completely match—the calendar year is a touch shorter than the solar year.

It may not seem like much of a difference, but after a few years those extra quarter days in the solar year begin to add up. After four years, for example, the four extra quarter days would make the calendar fall behind the solar year by about a day. Over the course of a century, the difference between the solar year and the calendar year would become 25 days! Instead of summer beginning in June, for example, it wouldn't start until nearly a month later, in July. As every kid looking forward to summer vacation knows—calendar or no calendar—that's way too late! So every four years a leap day is added to the calendar to allow it to catch up to the solar year.

Sometimes we really envy those born on this day !! They only get to celebrate their birthday every 4 years !!!!! So how lucky you are when you are 80years old ... and can proudly says that you are only 20 !!!!! Only set back is that no one would celebrate with you for the next 3 years....as on the 28th February its not your birthday yet...and on 1st of March..your birthday has already passed !!!

And they even has a special page dedicated to leap years !!!

On the not so positive side, the 29th day of every month would be mark a black day in my life history. Its been 2 month since that unfaithful day.... my heart is still hurt and the wound has not healed ... only deepens ...