Today is the day when women can traditionally ask men to marry them instead of the more usual practice of the guy asking the girl.
This is based on some obscure reference to the Scottish Paliament having passed a law in 1288 to that effect. Further, it would seem a man who refuses can be fined in the sum of £1, a pair of gloves… and a kiss!! There are no extant parliamentary records to this effect however! 🙂
What’s more it was supposedly introduced by Queen Margaret… who was aged five at the time and lived in Norway. Still, it’s a nice idea.
On the radio this morning I heard a male announcer relate this story and ask his female newsreader if *she* would be asking anyone to marry her. Her response was "Why should I get married? I’ve done nothing wrong!". I like it.
Shortly afterwards the announcer told us about his favourite Tommy Cooper joke which involved him watching his wedding video running backwards. That way he could see himself leaving the church a free man!
There’s a lesson somewhere in all this I’m sure. 🙂
Something that interested me… being of a strange mind… is why it was called a *leap* year. So I looked it up. There are hardly any references to tell us why exactly it’s called ‘leap’ this this might be as good as any:
Divide the 365-day typical year by 52 weeks. You will see that there is one additional day. Thus, in nonleap years, if a fixed-date holiday, such as Christmas, was held on a Tuesday, one knew that the next year it would fall on a Wednesday. But in a leap year, the festival would fall two days after the previous year’s. This skipping of a day is the "leap" in leap year.
Trouble is that even after reading that I’m not sure I understand why it’s called a ‘leap’ year any more than I did before. 🙂
Maybe this is simpler?
The noun is O.E. hlyp (Anglian *hlep). Leap year (M.E.) so called from its causing fixed festival days to "leap" ahead one day in the week
It’ll do me anyway.
The Eclectic Interweb 