Our #Calendar SUCKS. Here's Why YOU Should Care

 

Our calendar sucks.

Yes, that thing on your phone, on your desk and maybe even still on the wall that tells you what day it is. It's screwed up, royally.

And here's why you should care about this:

You think you've got enough work lined up to pay your employees (and the bills) next month. Then you realize that this is November, or April, and there are LESS days than you expected. You may be screwed by an entire workday of less work, and less monthly income!

You spend your time singing a song to figure out how many days we have this month. That's ridiculous.

You spend time and money buying new calendars every year, because every year is wildly different.

Each business quarter is a different length, so its difficult to compare apples to apples when figuring out sales, salaries, etc.

You can't figure out, easily, how many days are left in the year, or how many have passed. And maybe you've never tried to work this out, because it's just too complicated.

BUT THERE'S HOPE. All we have to do is change the way way mark days.

We don't have to shorten the year. It can still be 365 or 366 days long. (And it should be, since that's how long our year IS, according to astronomy)

All we have to do is re-work the messy calendar we have now to make it MAKE SENSE.

The good news is that this has already been done. We just have to choose one. Here are some examples:

There's a calendar, the Sol Calendar, in which EVERY MONTH begins on the same day of the week (Monday, Tuesday, etc.) and every month has exactly 28 days, except December, which has 29, and 30 on leap years every four years. The trick here is that there are 13 months, instead of 12. It makes far more sense than our current calendar.

Another calendar reform idea, the 30x11 ("thirty-eleven") Calendar, has 30 days in every month, again except for December, which has 35, or 36 on leap years. Too many days? Nope. The year still has 365 or 366 days, it just puts the 31st days and leap day in December. A huge benefit, when figuring out how many days have passed in a year. For example, Day 100 would ALWAYS be April 10th.

The Symmetry454 calendar is a grand experiment in symmetry. It features four equal quarters of three months each, consisting of 28, 35 and 28 days, respectively (or 4 weeks, 5 weeks and 4 weeks for the three months repeating, symmetrically, each quarter, from which the calendar derives its name.) In leap years, a seven-day week is appended to December, making it a 35-day month. Business owners and accountants will be happily surprised to learn that it has symmetrically equal quarters, and every month begins on a Monday.

The New Earth Calendar would be a bit of a hybrid of two of the above proposals. It has the 13-month format of the Sol Calendar as well as the 7-day leap week of the Symmetry454 Calendar, making an interesting and attractive calendar proposal that attempts to have the best of both worlds, and does so with a great measure of success. It has a perpetual 364-day year of 13 identical months of 28 days each.

This calendar is astoundingly simple to remember - all months have 28 days - and every month and every year starts on a Monday. Why don't we have something like this?

In fact, why we don't have ANY of these proposals, rather than the clunky, screwed up calendar we have now?

DEMAND CHANGE!

First, EDUCATE YOURSELF. Check out "A New Calendar For The World," a cheap eBook that describes these and even MORE ideas to fix the calendar.

Then TAKE ACTION by demanding that our elected officials fix the calendar.

Making the Case for Returning to a 13-Month Calendar [Calendar Reform Blog]

  

In ancient times, and even in some contemporary societies, calendars were 13 months in length, rather than 12. 

The Sol Calendar proposal would bring back the 13-month calendar, and, aside from the superstitious fear of the number Thirteen, it's very much worth considering.

This calendar reform idea was developed by Jim Eikner of Austin, Texas, and consists of a year of 13 months in length with the first 12 months having 28 days each, and the final month of the year, December, having 29. December would have 30 days in leap years, which line up with the leap years in the current Gregorian calendar.

The months are named the same as they are in the Gregorian calendar, except that a month called Sol - named for our Sun - is inserted between June and July, and it is this month that gives the calendar its name.

Although every month within the same year begins on the same day of week, the months begin on different days of the week in different years.

The 13-month Sol Calendar is a new take on a very old idea. It is, in fact, an adaptation of International Fixed Calendar, which in turn has its roots in the Positivist Calendar created by French philosopher August Comte in 1849.

Here's how it works:

In each year, the 29th and 30th days in December move the first day of the January of the following year either one or two weekdays forward in relation to that previous year. 

However, within any given year, monthly calendars for January through November remain identical to each other, in that they start on the same day of the week – and of course, are all 28 days in length.

Some of the great features and benefits of the 13-month Sol Calendar:

• Twelve contiguous and identical months of exactly 28 days
• The thirteenth month of the year (December) has 29 days normally and 30 days in a leap year
• This calendar has the same names for the months as the Gregorian Calendar
• The new month (Sol) occurs between June and July
• Preserves the standard, 7-day week
• Preserves Gregorian leap year rule
• Almost all professional accounting systems offer a 13-period reporting option
• Computer accounting programs will likely be easily adjusted to 13 months
• Placing the new month (Sol) at mid-year minimizes the seasonal displacement of the traditional months
• Placing the extra day(s) at the end of the year allows all months to be identical for their first 28 days in any given year
• Leap years are every four years (in the same years we currently have leap years) and they add a 366th day to December (a Dec. 30), the same number of days the Gregorian calendar adds during a leap year

Overall, as a practical matter, this calendar effectively addresses some current concerns with the Gregorian calendar.

Unlike our current jumble of month sizes, the Sol Calendar's 28-day months can easily be remembered, and the leap year is more rationally located at the end of the year, rather than tucked after February (which hasn't been considered the end of the year for many centuries.)

Since each month's calendar is the same for the first 11 months (and identical through the 28th day every month) it's easy to remember that the 27th day of every month in 2011, for example, was a Wednesday.

Learn more here: http://www.abbottepub.com/newcal.html

The New Earth #Calendar - Making Our Calendar Better!

A truly innovative and noteworthy calendar reform proposal is the New Earth Calendar. It features 13 months of exactly 28 days each. 

It lacks a "leap day" and waits 5 or 6 years and simply adds a "leap WEEK" of 7 days to the year. This keeps the calendar perpetual, while preserving the traditional 7-day week. Keep reading for an official explanation, including other benefits.

(Text below is from the newearthcalendar.com Website.)

"The New Earth Calendar is intended to serve and benefit all the people on Earth. It is not influenced by religion, politics, nationality, race or sex. It simply correlates the relationship between the earth, its rotation and annual journey around the sun. It applies equally to all inhabitants of Earth, and only Earth because it would be meaningless on any other planet, around any other sun or in any other solar system. It is unique to us.

Consider having just one monthly calendar, rather than the 28 in our current system. The New Earth Calendar is a practical refinement of the Gregorian calendar we now use and would eliminate the many inconsistencies that have been perpetuated for more than 2000 years. Thirteen equal months of 28 days. Each quarter has exactly 13 weeks and an equal number of workdays.

Each week, month and year starts on a Monday, never a Sunday. Sunday is the last day of the week and would always be on the 7th, 14th, 21st, and 28th of the month. 

Each country will be able to set their holidays in accordance with local custom, but generally, with the exception of Easter, they will always be on a fixed date and day of the week. 

They could be set so as to establish long weekends, but shorten the “dead week” that typically happens between Christmas and New Year’s Day. With The New Earth Calendar and Sundays always on fixed dates, the possible dates for Easter are reduced from around 35 to about 5 or 6."

5 Ways To "Re-Boot" Our #Calendar [#CalendarReform Blog]

 

Is our calendar perfect? Few would argue that it is. The number of days in each month are uneven, its quarters are unequal, and it's impossible to determine when on which day of the week any random date will fall.

But it turns out, there are many, many other - arguably better - ideas to reform it and make how we mark time more predictable and easier.

Here are just FIVE:

1. The 13-Moon Calendar. Inspired by the ancient Mayan Long-Count calendar, this proposal to reform the current Gregorian calendar re-names all the months, and introduces other innovations, including an extra month, which approximates many ancient calendars.

2. The Symmetry454 Calendar is a proposal by a Toronto university professor. It features four exactly equal quarters of 28-, 35- and 28-day months, making it easier to compare fiscal quarters. It's beautiful symmetry contrasts with the chaotic Gregorian.



3. The 13-month "Sol" Calendar updates an Old Idea - the 13- month year tied to the lunar cycle. This calendar's 13 months are all 28 days long, making it easy to remember the length of months. A leap year is added to the last month, December, and a new month, Sol, is added between June and July.

4. The New Earth Calendar is a bit of a hybrid - mixing the best elements of proposals like the Symmetry454 calendar and the 13 months of the Sol calendar.

5. Finally, the 30x11 Calendar is what its creator calls a "Gentle Update" of our current calendar. All of its months are 30 days long, except December, which rounds out the 365 or 366-day year with 35 or 36 days. It makes it incredibly easy to determine what day number each day on the calendar holds, and makes it easy to remember days.

All of these calendars - and MANY MORE - can be found EXCLUSIVELY on the new Abbott ePublishing eBook "A New Calendar for The World" available from the Abbott ePublishing website.