Long and Short Months

If you can't remember--and I never can--Coleridge's rhyme about "thirty days hath September," try this: make two fists and put them together, with the knuckles up. Starting at the left, with the knuckle of the little finger of your left hand, let each knuckle and the depression between knuckles represent a month. January is the knuckle of your little finger, February the dip between that and the next knuckle, March the knuckle of your left ring finger, and so on. The knuckles are long months of 31 days, and the depressions are short ones, usually 30 days, but of course February is an exceptionally short one. This shows you graphically that, except for the two long months July and August, the knuckles of your left index and right index fingers, long and short months alternate through the year.