Happy Leap Year Day… or whatever. Since this day only rolls around every 4 years, I’m not sure what people call it. Do you? I guess it is Leap Day.

We have this extra day on our calendar in order to keep our dates synchronized with the seasons. If not, after a hundred years or so, we’d have our seasons all out of whack. Summer would be in the Spring, Winter in the Fall, etc. So we ‘leap’ over this extra day during a common year, but this year no leaping will occur. There is a (quite complex) formula for figuring out the rules of the leap year, but I have never been all that great with math, so I’ll let you look it up. It is very interesting and if I were going to be around 400 years from now, I might do the math.

An old Irish tradition allows a woman to propose marriage to the man of their choice on leap day. What’s more, this old folk tradition forbade men of rejecting the woman! Although there are plenty of women who propose marriage these days, I can only imagine the men of Ireland hiding in the hills avoiding the desperate ladies! At least they only found themselves in this quandary every 4 years.

If your birthday falls on this day, then you technically only have a birthday every four years. Not so great when you are a child, but as an adult, it would be awesome! People with leap year birthdays are referred to as a leapling or leaper.

So what will you be doing this Leap Day? Capone’s Dinner & Show would like to invite you to our Orlando dinner show. We promise not to force you into any ‘special arrangement,’ and our show will be a favorable memory for leap years to come.  If today is your birthday, let us know! We’ll make sure everyone in the audience celebrates this special occasion with you. After all, it only comes around once every 4 years. Just don’t wait another four years to come back and see us!

Last Updated on February 29, 2012