Yogurt
by Jeff
Image text: I am firmly of the opinion that if something doesn't have a year on it, every time the expiration date rolls around it is good again for the two weeks preceding that date.
The Julian Calendar was introduced by Julius Caesar (hence the name) in 45 BC. It created the year that we know these days of 365 days and the beginning of the year as we know it of January 1st. However, they incorrectly calculated the leap years, establishing one every 3 years instead of four. This caused the calendar to slip from the solar calendar.
For a period of time (about 170 years), both the Julian and Gregorian calendars were in use in Europe. Soviet Russia did not move to the Gregorian calendar until 1918. Greece also moved to the Gregorian calendar in the 20th century. Both countries were required to drop a significant number of days.
The Gregorian calendar is named after Pope Gregory and created a calendar that was 10.8 minutes a year shorter than the Julian calendar and establish a leap year once every 4 years instead of 3.
If the character in the comic has to attempt to differentiate between the Julian and Gregorian calendars on a food item, it is at least 100 years old if it was manufactured in Greece or Soviet Russia. Otherwise it is more than 300 years old. I think it can be thrown out.
May 7th, 2010
I think you are concentrating too much on the Julian/Gregorian calendar issue, and missing the joke that it’s hard to tell the difference between yogurt that’s good and yogurt that’s bad. Plus the general tendency of some folks to leave questionable items in the fridge long after they should be thrown out.
As far as the Julian calendar… The Romans realized their 4-year/3-year problem before 1AD and dropped a few leap-years until it was correct again in the mid-1st century. The Gregorian calendar was developed because the average length of the Julian year is 365.25 days while the actual average length of the year is closer to 365.2422 days long. The Gregorian reform removed 3 leap-years out of every 100 to bring the average Gregorian year length to 365.2425 days.
The initial Julian leap-year problem was caused by two issues: 1) Romans counted time differently. A Roman would say that we have 8-day weeks: SunMonTueWedThuFriSatSun. We would say that would mean that Sundays are part of two different weeks, and the Romans would retort “Yes, and?”. This method of counting doesn’t match well with what GJC intended. 2) GJC was assassinated after the calendar reform but before the first leap year period was completed.
May 10th, 2010
Of course, eurocentrism aside, “civilization” wasn’t using the Gregorian calendar: civilization outside of Europe European used neither the Gregorian nor the Julian.
May 10th, 2010
The CCCP, which you refer to as “Soviet Russia”, was founded on 30th December 1922.
May 10th, 2010
There’s something else you’re missing, though: much food packaging features a printed date code that specifies the processing date. It’s usually near the more easily understood “sell by” date. This date is often presented as a three-digit code representing the date as the n-th day of the year (e.g. January 1 is 001, December 31 is 365, July 4 is 185, etc.). This system of date numbering is called a Julian date.
May 17th, 2010
“The Gregorian reform removed 3 leap-years out of every 100 to bring the average Gregorian year length to 365.2425 days”.
Correction: The Gregorian reform removed 3 leap-years out of every 400 years.