Forever Young

Mark Williamson looked forward to celebrating his 21st birthday with friends in Las Vegas. Then he showed his California driver's license to the bartender.

"Today's not the 29th," the bartender said, refusing to serve him.

"But I celebrate my birthday today," Williamson said, referring to Feb. 28.

The bartender was not swayed.

"Dude, I'm 21!" Williamson continued. "Come on!"

Williamson, who turns 40 Friday, is one of an estimated 1,368 leap year babies (also called leaplings) residing in Clark County. Three out of every four years, the calendar leaps over not only Feb. 29, but their birthdays.

"It's been kind of interesting," says Williamson, now a banquet chef at Wynn Las Vegas, who explains that his unique birthday still presents some problems from Web sites asking for personal information.

"There are times when you enter a birthday and it'll say, 'That doesn't exist,' " Williamson says. "So you have to make up a different day."

The bug once plagued the popular video site YouTube.

"But they were good about it and fixed it right away," Williamson says.

When retired teacher Gale Labovitz moved to Las Vegas from Washington, D.C., five years ago, she had to wait at the DMV for what she describes as "God knows how long."

"The computer kept kicking my name back without a license," she remembers. "It never even occurred to me why, but my renewal date was coming out on Feb. 29 in a non leap year."

Eventually, a DMV supervisor interceded with a manual override.

"My husband was done 45 minutes before I was," says Labovitz, who turns 64 Friday.

The earth doesn't revolve around the sun every 365 days exactly. It takes an extra quarter day per year, which was a problem for early calendar setters. In 45 B.C., Julius Caesar -- under the advice of Cleopatra's astrologer -- changed the Roman calendar to include an extra day every four years, so it would sync up to astronomical observations.

From that point on, roughly one of every 1,461 people born would be denied a birthday three out of every four years.

"The other kids in elementary school just didn't get it," says Jessica Carroll, a PBS literacy outreach assistant who turns 28 Friday. "I got tired of trying to explain it to them. They didn't understand the day not being there, so I just gave up.

"I'm like, 'My birthday's on February 28th.' "

There are some advantages to being a leap year baby. Chief among them is a game in which leaplings get to claim, with varying degrees of conviction, to be 75 percent younger.

"I figure since I'm hitting 40, now's the time I can start going, 11, 12, 13," Williamson says. "It kind of makes me feel a little younger."

And while leap year babies usually receive as many birthday parties as everyone else (usually on Feb. 28), a much bigger one is conferred every leap year.

"It's more special when it comes around," says Tanya Barnes, a public administration major at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas who turns "5" Friday and says she's heard "something about a surprise party."

Williamson is going to Disneyland. It's a fairly typical way to spend one's 10th birthday.

"Only, my wife is taking me," he says.

For Carroll, it's bingo at the Cannery. Perhaps she's practicing for her 15th birthday party.

"I know, it sounds like such an old person thing to do," she says. "But I think it's a fun game, and I really don't play it that often."

Labovitz is celebrating what she calls her "sweet 16 again" in Napa Valley.

"To me, it's way over the top," she says. "But I think it's lovely that my husband wants to do it."

Of course, there is another advantage to being a leap year baby.

"Nobody else gets interviewed by a newspaper because of their birthday," Carroll says.

Contact reporter Corey Levitan at clevitan@ reviewjournal.com or (702) 383-0456.