Numerology of dates

Some people like to look at numerical dates and extract properties from them. This is a harmless piece of fun, as long as one doesn’t try to interpret these arbitrary numerical properties as having some influence on real life. No-one minds American math students deciding to call 3/14 (14th March) “pi day”, or noting that it would have been especially apt in 1592, but anyone who sees significance in that being exactly 100 years after Columbus “sailed the ocean blue” invites the label “nutter”.

Dates like 9/9/99 or 11/11 are bound to attract attention, so today’s date 2/2/22 is undoubtedly up there with the best of them. Such dates of course occur 9 times per century, or about once every 4000 days. Five copies of the same digit will occur on 22/2/22 (European style) or 2/22/22 (American style), and already occurred on 11/1/11 and 1/11/11, but will not occur again this century, while six copies occur only once per century, on 11/11/11.

But what if we write today’s date out in full, as 02/02/2022? Perhaps not as satisfying, then, as 02/02/2020. But what about 22/02/2022, which only works in European style? Surely the most significant date in the entire 21st century?! I hope you are making suitable plans to celebrate it – I know I am. You won’t see anything like it again before 11/12/2111.

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