Leap Day

Since February 29 only happens once every four years, I feel an obligation to post even during a fairly busy week.

The last time this day occurred, I was a fairly new blogger, so I got into the act as well. One of the biggest parts of the post was a tribute to the old family dog, Sassy, who was born on a Leap Day. (A day later, I would have a little fun running the Sassy story back and forth through the Babelfish translation engine a few times.)

But as entertaining as it was to have a Leap Dog (a status to which she would occasionally live up by jumping back and forth between the sectional couches), I always wondered what it would be like to be a person whose birthday only technically occurred every four years. The 2004 post told of a guy born in 1908 who was celebrating his "24th" birthday (I wonder if he made it to both the quarter-century and century mark simultaneously yesterday), and this afternoon, a friend told me about his English teacher in middle school who celebrated her "16th" birthday while he was in her class; we figured out that she still wouldn't be "old enough to drink" yet. Heh.

Have you ever known a Leap Day person? Do they handle their odd birthday with humor, or is it a source of annoyance to them? And has their often-nonexistent birthday ever fouled up a computer database or anything?

Here's hoping that the extra day is going well for you.