This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Rutgers chapter.
The Earth doesn’t actually make its way around the sun in 365 days, it’s like there’s a little lag of a fourth of a day which is why every four years, the portions combine together to make the leap day! (This is not scientifically explained or super accurate please google to an official source if you want to know the scientific reason because apparently I’m terrible at explaining things especially scientific things so this is just a disclaimer.)
So what should you do with this extra day?
Here are some ideas:
1. Study for exams/Take exams
Because professors don’t care, it’s like any old day to them. Hello??? This day is almost like a holiday except obviously not annual which should make it more special?? When will they acknowledge.
2. Celebrate birthdays!
Find someone who was born on February 29 and eat cake with them. Joke about how they’re actually their age divided by four. Because they don’t get that every year (just every leap year). But def wish them a good birthday aside from all the jokes. It’s a tough life when your legitimate birthday isn’t annual like everyone else’s.
(Did you know that someone who is born on the leap day is called a leapling?? Almost makes me want to be born then too.)
3. Sleep/Netflix
Unless it’s your birthday, it’s basically just another day in your life. Use those precious extra hours to catch up on your favorite show or catch up on sleep.
4. Celebrate half birthdays!
Why not? Always a reason for cake.
5. Think about February and marvel
February is such a great month. It’s so short, there’s so much chocolate this month, it was the birthday of some great presidents, we find out if winter is going to be shorter or longer, and it’s the month that leap day happens. None of this (except Valentine’s Day) was pre-planned (unless you count presidents’ day but like Abe and George were both born in Feb and you can’t change that soo yah), so just take a moment and marvel at how wild that is.
In case you didn’t have plans for February 29, now you do!!