February 30

Ever tell your little brother that you'd do something for him on February 30? Or worse yet tell him that the date was February 30. OK OK I'll fess up. We even told my little brother that his birthday was on Valentine's day. The trouble is, we never told him when Valentine's day was. So when he was supposed to tell the teacher his birthday, he didn't know. And of course, being my little brother, he argued with her and had to stand in the corner.

Well February 30 was actually a real date in Sweden and in the Soviet Union. Both these additions were temporary though. If you have read about leap year, you know that the calendar isn't exactly right or in sync with the sun and the earth's revolution around it. Many years ago they had to change the calendar a couple of times to "fix" this. That's how they came up with the current leap year system.

Well in the Swedish calendar there was an error with the conversion in the 18th century. Sweden planned their conversion in 1700, but that year was supposed to be a leap year. Soon Sweden's calendar was all messed up and didn't match either the Julian or Gregorian calendar. They switched back to the Julian calendar and added February 30 one year. They eventually switched to the Gregorian calendar in 1753.

The Soviets were trying something quite different. They thought a five day week would improve efficiency. So in 1929, they went to 30 day months of 5 day weeks. The left over days were holidays. Remember that there are 365 days in a normal year. If the twelve months each have 30 days that's just 360 days. Now if you are thinking "Wait a minute, there are more than 5 weekend days in a year!" You are right. The Soviet people thought the same thing. Eventually in 1940 they changed back to a seven day week because the people just couldn't get used to not resting on Sunday.