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George Huxtable
>
> Bill may find it of interest to see how our Gregorian Calendar adjusts to
> cater for that figure of 365.7422, by throwing in an occasional leap year
> day, or sometimes omitting it..

George, is there is a typo above (365.7422 Vs 365.2422) or are you are
playing with my mind...just because you can? 
>
> If we never had a leap year, all years would be 365 days long.
>
> Throwing in a leap year of 366 days, one year in four, would mean that each
> 4-year period would have 1461 days, an average of 365.25.
>
> However, omitting that leap year in each century-year would mean that each
> century would contain 36424 days, an average of 365.24.
>
> But then reinstating that leap year when the century year divides by 400 (as
> happened on Feb 29 2000) means that in 400 years there are 146097 days,
> averaging 365.2425. That, I think, is where we have got to as of now, and
> you can see we are getting pretty close to the intended value of 365.2422.

Understood. Just assumed the NA would have printed the offset value to at
least degrees and minutes if significant.
>
> The next step would be to choose, every 4th millennium, to omit the leap
> year that would otherwise occur every 400 years, which would bring the
> four-millennium total to 1460969, and the average to 365.24225. I don't know
> whether the Almanac compilers, calendar makers, and computer system builders
> have been alerted to that one yet, but they had better be careful not to be
> taken by surprise in AD 4000!

I think they are aware.  I have read 3,000 years or 3000 AD (cannot
recall) before the system ran into a required adjustment all things being
equal.  The amazing part to me being the "ancients" had that grasp on the
workings of our little spot in the universe.

Thanks

Bill B.


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