Every four years we get a little something extra. Nope, not the presidential election, nor the Summer Olympics.  This is something unique – we get a Leap Day.

Now, wouldn’t it be great if Leap Day was a national paid holiday – an extra day to do whatever you wanted to? It wouldn’t be a holiday that must fall on a Monday, or one designated just for government worker bees, but for everyone.  Too bad it must be tacked onto February, as the weather is not conducive for much fun in a typical Michigan February.  I kind of like this idea and perhaps we ought to broach it to our next Prez – after all, he or she has a few years to get it implemented before 2020.

Well, this extra day on our February calendar also brought a quirky side effect and interesting phenomenon here in the Schaub household. Not so magically, when the clock turned midnight today, February 29^th, my landline phone rolled over to March 1^st.   While your Mac and Windows products and your smartphones all “got it” … my speaker phone did not.  I call this dilemma: “smartphone versus dumbphone” and now, this not-so-technically-apt person must find the manual to work on her “dumbphone” … I guess I’ll have to reset the time from scratch and hopefully that is all, because I sure can’t call upon the folks at RadioShack these days.

Speaking of Leap Day, and the topic of leaping, yesterday’s weather would make you leap for joy when it shattered that 1880 record of 60 degrees. The BBQs were out as were the motorcyclists that were zooming around the neighborhood once we hit 63 degrees!  But today was not so special weather-wise.  Those gusty winds and brooding clouds weren’t geared to make you, or me, jump for joy and this overnight freezing rain and tomorrow’s 3-5 inch snowfall may make me turn the alarm off altogether.  Suffice it to say that March will come in like a lion.  It seems that Winter sure took its sweet time getting here, and now this season is somewhat conflicted – it reminds me of that old tune by The Clash – “Should I Stay or Should I Go?”

Well, I didn’t meet my goal of 100 miles walked to date as of February 29, 2016, even with the extra day, but then the weather was funky a good part of February as well, so I shan’t whine about it (in this forum anyway). Plus, with the impending snow and freezing rain, I decided the car needed a run more than I needed the walk this morning, so we drove up and down Fort Street and tooled around town a bit to give the buggy a good run since it won’t be out of the garage for a few days.  I’m sorry to say that the miles walked and miles driven are now neck-in-neck at 87, so I need to get out there and walk more miles, probably next weekend when the temps climb to the 50s and 60s and all the snow will melt again.  Anymore, I’m confused when I suit up – do I wear the walking shoes or the lug-soled boots this morning?  Guess I have to peer outside first.

I just Googled “when does the time change and we Spring forward?”  That will be March 13^th.  Just as the sun is rising earlier every day and I could set out for a longer walk during the workweek, the time change will occur and I’ll have to make the adjustment once again.  Grrrr.

As we inch ever closer to Spring and warm and sunny days, we are buoyed by these interludes of shed-your-coat-and-hat days … they help to banish the blahs from the cold and snowy weather that we are accustomed to here in Southeast Michigan.

[Image “Leap Year Symbol 2016” from Jhnri4 at openclipart.org]