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Wanna Fool Around With the Calendar--Again?

Tim Clark
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If you are one of the many people who have trouble remembering what comes after “Thirty days hath September,” then you might be interested in calendar reform.

There is a movement afoot to simplify the calendar by making a year consistent with thirteen months, with each month exactly twenty-eight days long. The extra month would be called Sol (after our Sun) and would fall between June and July, thus giving those of us in the northern hemisphere an extra month of summer.

Among the advantages of this system, called the international fixed calendar, is the fact that we wouldn't need a new calendar every year (bad news for calendar makers but good news for the rest of us). Every month would begin on a Sunday and end on a Saturday, and every date would fall on the same day of the week every year.

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For those of you who have been doing some quick calculating, you are right—the international fixed calendar has only 364 days in the year. The extra day would be stuck in between December 28 and January 1 and would be designated a world holiday, identified with no month or day of the week. In leap years, there would be a second world holiday wedged in between June 28 and Sol 1.

One of the disadvantages of the international fixed calendar is that thirteen months can't be easily divided into quarters for business purposes. This has led to a counterproposal—the world calendar, made up of four 91-day quarters, each consisting of a 31-day month followed by two 30-day months. Once again, it adds up to 364 days, and so one day would be set aside for general hoopla.

But perhaps you are a traditionalist. “Why fool around with the calendar?” you ask. “It was good enough for Moses, and it's good enough for me.” In fact, people have been fooling around with the calendar for as long as calendars have existed. But that's another story for another time …

Calendar
About The Author

Tim Clark

Tim Clark (1950-2021) began work as an editor and writer at Yankee Publishing in 1980. During his 41 years here, he was a prolific contributor to both Yankee Magazine and the Old Farmer's Almanac. Read More from Tim Clark

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Comments

Wee Bear (not verified)

1 year 6 months ago

If you think of the year as 52 weeks rather than in terms of months, it works out:
2 weeks = 1 fortnight
4 weeks = 1 month
13 weeks = 1 quarter
26 weeks = 1 semester

the basic structure is fine, but there are a number of details that could be improved.
counting days/months/years from 0 rather than 1 makes the clock and calendar numbering systems the same. It also avoids imposing Roman month names on a world that is predominantly not Roman.
using Dec 21 as the day outside of the months (and Jun 21 as the leap day) aligns the calendar with the seasons

theAbysmal Calendar's put a lot of work into this over the past 20 years.

Robert Zumstein (not verified)

2 years 1 month ago

you can not have a non day

"oh whens your birthday" "I dont have one, I was born on a nonday, there for I never have a birthday" "to compensate me for this, the governments makes sure I dont work, I am treated like royalty, but again, no birth certificate, means no passports, ssi card etc erc

ThomasN (not verified)

12 years 8 months ago

The idea of 28 days and thirteen months seems good in paper, but religious people (e.g. Jews) are going to find problems with it, especially if the "extra" day is not associated with a month nor with a day of the week. The same goes with the second "world holiday" during leap years. Another problem is that thirteen sometimes has an association with bad luck. Twelve does not.

why should the global calendar be beholden to any one belief system?