"28 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes... 12 seconds. That... is when the world... will end."
--Donnie Darko
I'm not a numerologist or an astrologist, I don't practice alchemy or any of the dark arts, and I'm seriously lacking in Jedi-Force powers, and mutant telekinesis. Yeah sure, that's all phooey, right? But in that vein of supernatural studies and interests, I've noticed strange, repeating occurences of the number 28 in the past ten months or so. What does it all mean? What's the significance of this figure, and why do I see it so often? Here's what I've discovered so far:
Average number of days in the Lunar Cycle: 28
Average number of days for the menstrual cycle of a human woman: 28
Number of days for an average human's skin to renew itself: 28
Number of days in February on non leap-years: 28
Number of days in a Solar Neutrino cycle (journey from sun to earth): 28
Number of days after moving in that the Lutz family moved out of the Amityville house because it was haunted: 28
Number of days before the world ends in the movie "Donnie Darko": 28
Number of days Sandra Bullock has to stay in rehab in the movie "28 Days": 28 days, maybe?
Number of days it takes for England to go off the deep end in "28 Days Later": Take a wild guess
28-Step Programs found on Google: "Write a book in 28 days", "28 Steps to Fearless Speaking", "28 Steps to Maximize Your Firm's Cash Flow"
I've also found websites advocating 28 Hour days as opposed to the standard 24.
And then, a few hours after I wrote this blog and saved it as a draft, I have this conversation with my cousin Alison:
Stupid Cupid092: if caroline told me what "28 if" means
Stupid Cupid092: i would HAVE 2 sit on guys side @ chrch
Stupid Cupid092: just 2 be near josh
Cbake1369: Wait what?
Cbake1369: 28 if?
Stupid Cupid092: it is a liscense plate on the abbey road pic of the beatles
Beatles huh. Another weird coincidence. I'm probably seeing far more than is actually there, but it all struck me as pretty interesting, especially when filmmakers place such importance on the number 28.
And between 300-800 years ago, the Plains Indians of Wyoming constructed the "Bighorn Medicine Wheel" (here) at the top of the Bighorn Mountain range 9, 642 feet up, used to discern allignments of stars related to the summer solstice. Made of piled stones, this wheel is 87 feet long in diameter and has- that's right- 28 spokes. The number 28 was very special to some Indian tribes, apparently because of its relation to the Lunar cycle.
And according to that website, the star Rigel would rise 28 days after the summer solstice, and then the star Sirius would rise 28 days after that. Interesting, no? NO? It's not? Oh, so I AM just a damn geek then, is that it?
Fine. Then a geek I shall be.
--Cbake
PS: If there are any other Star Wars geeks out there, I suggest you click the link. Looks like there may be a star out there that was an inspiration for George Lucas's naming of the planet Alderaan.
PPS: If anyone else knows of any other important 28's, please post them. I had a list of some a few months ago but have since lost it.
I'm not a numerologist or an astrologist, I don't practice alchemy or any of the dark arts, and I'm seriously lacking in Jedi-Force powers, and mutant telekinesis. Yeah sure, that's all phooey, right? But in that vein of supernatural studies and interests, I've noticed strange, repeating occurences of the number 28 in the past ten months or so. What does it all mean? What's the significance of this figure, and why do I see it so often? Here's what I've discovered so far:
Average number of days in the Lunar Cycle: 28
Average number of days for the menstrual cycle of a human woman: 28
Number of days for an average human's skin to renew itself: 28
Number of days in February on non leap-years: 28
Number of days in a Solar Neutrino cycle (journey from sun to earth): 28
Number of days after moving in that the Lutz family moved out of the Amityville house because it was haunted: 28
Number of days before the world ends in the movie "Donnie Darko": 28
Number of days Sandra Bullock has to stay in rehab in the movie "28 Days": 28 days, maybe?
Number of days it takes for England to go off the deep end in "28 Days Later": Take a wild guess
28-Step Programs found on Google: "Write a book in 28 days", "28 Steps to Fearless Speaking", "28 Steps to Maximize Your Firm's Cash Flow"
I've also found websites advocating 28 Hour days as opposed to the standard 24.
And then, a few hours after I wrote this blog and saved it as a draft, I have this conversation with my cousin Alison:
Stupid Cupid092: if caroline told me what "28 if" means
Stupid Cupid092: i would HAVE 2 sit on guys side @ chrch
Stupid Cupid092: just 2 be near josh
Cbake1369: Wait what?
Cbake1369: 28 if?
Stupid Cupid092: it is a liscense plate on the abbey road pic of the beatles
Beatles huh. Another weird coincidence. I'm probably seeing far more than is actually there, but it all struck me as pretty interesting, especially when filmmakers place such importance on the number 28.
And between 300-800 years ago, the Plains Indians of Wyoming constructed the "Bighorn Medicine Wheel" (here) at the top of the Bighorn Mountain range 9, 642 feet up, used to discern allignments of stars related to the summer solstice. Made of piled stones, this wheel is 87 feet long in diameter and has- that's right- 28 spokes. The number 28 was very special to some Indian tribes, apparently because of its relation to the Lunar cycle.
And according to that website, the star Rigel would rise 28 days after the summer solstice, and then the star Sirius would rise 28 days after that. Interesting, no? NO? It's not? Oh, so I AM just a damn geek then, is that it?
Fine. Then a geek I shall be.
--Cbake
PS: If there are any other Star Wars geeks out there, I suggest you click the link. Looks like there may be a star out there that was an inspiration for George Lucas's naming of the planet Alderaan.
PPS: If anyone else knows of any other important 28's, please post them. I had a list of some a few months ago but have since lost it.
posted by Cbake at 6:51 PM
5 Comments:
28 is also a "perfect number"- the sum of it's factors: 1+2+4+7+14=28.
the first several of these (6, 28, 496, 8128) have been looked at for some time- greeks, arabs (and later europeans) have written about them.
ancient people liked em both because of the aforementioned mathmatic property (also they are connected with prime numbers or something, but that's a bit too math nerdy for me to ask the internet about) and for precisely the reason you've listed here: they are noticable. specfically, the concept that god created the earth in 6 days (kinda important for some folk) and the lunar cycle of 28 days (important for perhaps all ancient societies).
the significance of the next two perfect #s, 496 and 8128, however, is beyond me...
at any rate, it's cool stuff, and thank goodness the internet is there to fill my head with knowledge i probably don't need...
yeah 28 days later, i remember seeing that movie with you cbake. i just wanted to say that my b-day is Feb. 28, so that's an important '28!' :) ~Evan
Jake Lemberg- is that you?
Thanks for the input, all that math stuff is very interesting and just what I hoped someone else would know about. Saves me the time to research it for sure.
To add more to the number "28"'s appearance in movies, well, it doesn't really work out, but in the movie "Magnolia" there was an abundance of the numbers 8 and 2, but that was just to match up with the Bible verse Exodus 8:2. So not really 28. But still. Yeah.
And Evan- I never see you online anymore. Do you have a new name? And in a few days... Happy Birthday!
Perhaps Revolution 9 was track 29 bc perhaps... Paul would have been 29 that year (if he had lived?)
DUN DUN DUNNN
Okay, not so spooky. And neither is February 28, as far as I know. It ain't the Ides of March, that's for sure.
28- that's how old I was the last time I was employed.
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