For some, 2008 one giant leap

On Leap Year day 2004, Alison Dermer sent her traveling boyfriend a video marriage proposal -- becoming a modern adherent to an ancient custom.

Among other superstitions and strange traditions attributed to Feb. 29, women have been encouraged to propose to men on the rarest day of the Gregorian calendar.

Today, she and Roger Briese will marry.

And for the Santa Monica bride-to-be, tying the knot on leap day carries a special meaning: It promotes the role of the female as the aggressor in romance.

"I just try and personally do things a little more against the grain," said Dermer, 42, who will keep her own last name. "Even today, more men ask a woman to marry them than vice versa. I just felt like rocking the boat a little."

Leap years' implications aren't only romantic.

They create headaches for expectant mothers who do not want their kids saddled with the odd birthday and the legal hassles that ensue. They frustrate many born on this date who want to register on Web sites that do not recognize the date.

Still, they're welcomed by fast-food junkies,who can take advantage of a number of special offers today.

Leap years were added as a way to correct a timekeepingerror in the Julian calendar, which didn't account for the fact that the earth takes about 3651/4 days to circle the sun. To simplify the oddity, our modern calendar tallies those quarter-days up, every four years to get Feb. 29.

Even among leap year days, today is special -- leap year Februaries that begin and end on Friday occur only once every 28 years.

While the leap year corrects celestial quirks, it can create personal problems.

Mothers-to-be often panic when they get the news they might give birth on the leap year day.

"They want to avoid it like the plague," said Dr. Peter Weiss, a Hidden Hills obstetrician-gynecologist who practices in Beverly Hills.

Calendars rarely make room for Feb. 29, but leap day babies agree the wait is worth it.

"Yeah, it only comes once every four years, but I enjoy it," says Danielle Vera, an Antioch native now studying sports medicine at the University of California, Davis. "It's really fun to talk to people about it, and have them be like 'whoa.'"

In her 20 years, Danielle reports, her leap birthday hasn't provoked much trouble, beyond occasional ribbing: "Sometimes my friends will be, 'You're only 5, you're too young.'"

Next year, though, she'll suffer a mild delay in one significant rite of passage: "When I turn 21," she says, "I can't get a drink on the 28th. I have to wait until, like, March."

For all the problems they must endure, Vera and others who share his birthday can at least get a large, one-topping pizza from Papa John's today.

Other businesses are also offering deals and events available to everyone. Boston Market has unilaterally designated Feb. 29 "National Order-In Day" and McDonald's will give out free McSkillet burritos with the purchase of a drink.

But the paltry reward hardly compensates for the lifetime of hassles leap year day babies face, said Peter Brouwer, co-founder of the 7,000-member Honor Society of Leap Year Babies.

"Almost everyone (of us) has encountered a problem because of their birthday," said Brouwer, who today will celebrate his 13th Feb. 29 birthday and 52nd solar revolution. "You get a hassle or a problem because someone doesn't believe you're born on Feb. 29. Because that's not a real day, is it?"

Brouwer has had plenty of trouble registering on popular Web sites that refused to recognize his Feb. 29 birthday.

"We can land people on the moon and we can transplant hearts," he said, "but computer programmers can't figure out leap day."

Staff writer Sara Steffens contributed to this report.

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