9 Comments
Sep 2, 2020Liked by Scott Hines

11 months of 30 days and December has 20. Anyone who has a birthday eliminated by the calendar can pick any day in his/her birth month to celebrate, AND there will be a huge blowout party for all those people on February 30th. (It will be customary to have a Freesday immediately afterward to give everyone a chance to recover.)

Christmas is now December 14th, so it falls 7 calendar days before New Year's. (American) Thanksgiving moves to November 17th (if I'm doing the calendar math correctly in my head - 3rd Thursday in November) to keep the shopping season more-or-less consistent. Retail workers are considered essential workers on November 18th and receive tripletime.

There cannot be a six-week period without a Freesday (to make sure there isn't a backlog). The only time there can be consecutive Freesdays is a huge tragedy (think 9/11 in scope). Meteorological records will now need to be kept in ordinal days (the record high/low/precipitation for Day 138 is....)

Shippers can charge more for guaranteed delivery in ordinal days vs. calendar days. Hotels cannot charge additional fees for Freesdays unless someone checks in on a Freesday. Births and deaths on a Freesday are recorded as both the last calendar day prior to the event and in ordinal days. Astronomical events will need to be announced/recorded in ordinal days.

And I've officially spent too much time figuring out rules for Freesday. If it happens, I should be part of the International Panel that designates them.

Expand full comment

So, if you're cutting down to 350 days, in 12 months, that's ten months of 29 days and two months of 30 days. ACB, you best not be eliminating my birthday!

Expand full comment
author

Also, I was heretofore unaware of the Eastman Calendar but I love it and it just shows that I would have been a titan of industry 100 years ago https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Fixed_Calendar

Expand full comment
author

Addressing a key question from Twitter: no, Freesdays do not roll over. The point is to use them.

Expand full comment