This year, those waiting to get that special New Year’s Eve kiss will have to wait one second longer to collect it. On the bright side, there will be one more second to accomplish those 2016 goals – if they are short. 

According to a press release from the U.S. Naval Observatory, a leap second will be inserted into the U.S. Naval Observatory’s Master Clock Facility in Washington D.C. at 23:59:59. The clock will reach 23:59:60 before turning to the New Year and displaying 00:00:00.  

You can even watch it happen on the U.S. Naval observatory’s Master Clock online at tycho.usno.navy.mil/what.html. Just remember to adjust for your time zone. In Kansas the time will be 6:00 p.m., Dec. 31. 

Though one second doesn’t do much to accomplish big goals and you can watch it tick away as quick as, well, a second, it does help align the historical method of keeping time by the earth’s rotation, called mean solar time or UT1, with the more precise atomic timescale of Coordinated Universal Time, or UTC, now used. 

The method of measuring time is one of world-wide importance and is accomplished through international agreements forged in 1970 that established a procedure to maintain a relationship between UTC and a measure of Earth’s rotation angle in space. That agreement, according to the U.S. Naval Observatory press release, allows a leap second to be inserted or removed as needed to keep the two measures within .9 seconds of each other.   

There is some reported confusion about the need for the leap second. There are also those who misunderstand and believe Earth is slowing in rotation. The hypothesis for Earth’s slowing its roll isn’t an accurate assumption according to information from the Naval observatory’s website. In fact, the two means of keeping time are simply different. The accumulation of those leap second intervals throughout the years is not a measure of the rate of rotational slowing. It is simply the measure of difference between the two timekeeping systems. Inserting a second periodically, the last one was inserted in 2005, helps the two measures stay synced.

The world will stay in sync and can mark time together thanks to that leap second. The rest of us can chose a way to spend that extra second like with a wink, a nod or a smile.

More things you can do in one second or less:

1. Give a thumbs up

2. Like a status

3. Take a sip of water

4. Blink

5. Frown

6. Say Thank you and mean it!

7. Make eye contact

8. Slam a door

9. Say yes

10. Say No

11. Look at the sky

12. Sing one good note

Transition to Farming

When we moved to Kansas a couple of years ago, we plunked ourselves in the center of a 25-acre parcel and bought some chicks. Now, two years into our dream of rural life we have about 40 chickens, a barn cat, a pair of donkeys who just delivered a little colt, a black angus steer and heifer,  seven Pygora goats, a peacock and three crazy ducks.

The Pygora goats are a lot of fun. they keep us entertained and provide me with the most beautiful fiber to develop my skill at spinning.

We made it through our first sheering by teamwork. Hubby got one side and I got the other. Whoever had their side prepped first - meaning picked free of stickers and vegetable matter - started shearing first. Then we passed the clippers over to the other one and that went on for our first five. We didn't get the other two until after that shearing.

Life is a lot of fun - those goats are pretty smart. They get into everything and they just want to hang out with you whenever you are outside. They are so social and full of energy. I can't help but love them.  Here they are "helping" dad put a hinged cover on their hay feeder. Turns out they like to jump into it and have a tendency to get themselves stuck after eating the "floor" out from under themselves.

My husband is such a good sport. It was -17 with the windchill and he was out there building a lid for the hay feeder... He's a keeper.

So, that little slider of summer/winter views of our "Old Bill" statue here at Fort Riley, Kansas, is a successful experiment. I'm playing with apps that help us illustrate information folks around here might need to know. This was just a quick exercise in how to remind people to plan for the upcomming winter weather - of course - a day later and it was 18 degrees F. Brrr....