Vernal Equinox – Time to Burn Your Socks

Today is the vernal equinox.  You may think this means that there is exactly the same amount of daylight hours and nighttime hours…and you would be wrong.

Technically, when daylight equals dark, that is called an equilux, and it falls on a different day of the year.  The equinox is actually when the Earth’s axis is neither tilted away from nor toward the sun.  It is the exact crossover between winter and summer…so you can see why it gets confused with daylight hours/dark hours.

In the boating community, the equinox marks the time to burn your socks and start wearing your shoes without ‘em.  In Maryland, there is a big Burning of the Socks festival, too.

Up here in Alberta, there is still three inches of snow on the ground, so I have no intention of burning my socks just yet.

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