Seize the day!

Ahhh . . . an extra 24 hours. An eighth day in the week. A 53d Sunday. A 366th day in the year. With Feb. 29 poised ahead in the datebook, it's a concept that intrigues.

What would you do if an extra day happened to fall from the sky and into your life, a bonus day to do whatever you wanted?

We're not talking about a vacation day, a snow day, an alleged sick day, or a personal day.

We're talking about the stuff of daydreams: a free 24 hours, no strings attached, thankyouverymuch.

Research shows that many people are so overworked these days that daydreaming is about as close as they can come to finding a free day. As we work more and so have less time afterward even for errands, the thought of a bonus 24 hours seems heavenly.

According to Boston College sociology professor Juliet B. Schor, author of ''The Overworked American: The Unexpected Decline of Leisure," the average employee is putting in about 200 hours more of work a year than his or her counterpart 30 years ago.

The average employed American now works more than 47 hours a week to keep up with mounting bills, according to the Center for a New American Dream, a Maryland nonprofit group that pushes quality-of-life issues. In a recent study, the group found that about half of the Americans surveyed said they would be willing to take a day's less pay each week for a day off.

Schor, who also wrote a chapter called ''The (Even More) Overworked American" in the 2003 handbook called ''Take Back Your Time," could easily be talking about herself. She didn't have time for an interview for this article, but in an e-mail to The Globe, she said her ideal extra day would be ''to write for half of it and then take a hike with my family."

In observance of leap year, created by that extra day in February that comes around only every four years -- and even less often on a Sunday -- City Weekly decided to let Greater Bostonians take a leap themselves and get all dreamy about how they would spend their ideal day off. Hey, we deserve it after this blustery and unforgiving winter.

By e-mail, scores of City Weekly and boston.com readers detailed their stories of what they would do with those extra 1,440 minutes.

''An extra day would be great to catch up with my wife," said newly wedded Carl Conui, who wants more alone time with his bride, Beata.

The North End couple married last September in Hungary, but found they lacked some quality alone-time there among the family and friends who flew out for the wedding.

''We definitely weren't on our own," Conui says, as he began to describe a romantic 24-hour dream day in Boston with his wife.

''I would love to have a mini-honeymoon in the city we love, yet still be close enough for me to answer my pages, and she can still talk to her clients if need be," said Conui, a podiatrist, who regularly sees his financial adviser wife prowling the neighborhood for up to an hour for a parking spot at the end of her work day. ''Because of her, I would like her to have a great night and day -- the whole 24 hours, ideally 26 hours, with me included, of course," he said.

The doc envisions a ''peaceful night" at The Ritz or Four Seasons, waking up to a room-service breakfast in bed of fruit, French toast, and bacon. Conui also wants his wife to be treated to a spa for a day full of manicure, pedicure, massage, and facial.

The rest of the day would be: a workout at a gym, some shopping on Newbury Street with a snack or lunch there, a stroll, and an evening dinner in the Back Bay. The two would end the day by taking a ''limo back to the North End and not worry about looking for parking."

While cleaning out the closet and shopping at Filene's Basement for some good underground bargains topped many people's to-do lists for their ideal day, others saw something else: a relaxing view.

They described using part of that 24 hours to take a deep breath, sit back and gaze at the Boston skyline from Bunker Hill, the Blue Hill Observatory, or the Charles River.

That's what Dr. Naomi Rice of Beacon Hill ordered for herself. She has been longing to hike at Middlesex Fells in Winchester and then take in ''the beautiful view of the Boston skyline from . . . Wright's Tower" in Medford.

During the week, her views are patient rooms and bright hallways at Massachusetts General Hospital, where she usually puts in more than 50 hours taking care of patients' aches and pains. Her other view is in the classroom, teaching the ropes to first-year students at Harvard Medical School.

Rice says it's just nice fantasizing about that bonus day, a day blessedly pager-free.

''My free day would start by sleeping in, my pager signed out to the physician covering me," said the 33-year-old. ''After waking, there's no way I could miss coffee at my local mom 'n' pop grocery, Beacon Hill Market."

After the hike and checking out the view from Wright's Tower, she said she would head to Chinatown for dinner, ''some spicy fried shrimp with the heads on and stir-fried watercress."

To end that perfect day, Rice would take a stroll on the banks of the Charles. Then she can turn her pager back on and get back to her patients.

Apparently, many of you are sleep-deprived. That request was among the most popular must-do, get-done items on the agenda.

Folks like Somerville's Lisa Lopez just want some shut-eye on the bonus day.

''I would not set the alarm clock, because I won't feel guilty about sleeping in when I have a million things to do," said Lopez, a National Science Foundation minority postdoctoral fellow at the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

She misses some of her Z's because she's working on a research project that follows 500 Spanish-speaking children from preschool through second grade in the Bay State, Maryland, and Puerto Rico. The project gauges their literacy skills in English and Spanish in the spring of each school year.

Besides getting some sleep, her day off would involve doing ''some of those things you take for granted when living in the city or never find time to do, such as go on the duck tour, walk the Freedom Trail, visit the Arnold Arboretum, or go to the Blue Hill Observatory.

''I think we all need and deserve those extra unaccounted-for days in life where you don't need to worry about what you are expected to get done, but instead can take in and enjoy your surroundings," she said.

For Kim Campbell of West Roxbury, the dream day would include spending more time with her daughter, 6-year-old Mia.

Finishing up her lunch of chicken and mashed potatoes at a Boston Market in Dorchester on a recent sunny afternoon, Campbell glanced down and fantasized about her ideal day.

''I would probably spend time with my daughter," said the 25-year-old single mother who works in law enforcement but asked that her agency not be named. She works weekends, so Feb. 29 won't make much of a difference to her; her days off are Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

''When you work so much, you really don't spend that much time with your kid these days," she said. ''The way Boston is, everything is so high that you have to work more. If you are offered overtime, you take it."

She would start those extra 24 hours sleeping in, but not so late, as she has to get her daughter to school.

''I would let her go to school, because I need some time for myself," says Campbell, who sees herself strolling at South Shore Plaza and looking for bargains. Once her daughter arrives home from school, she would play with her in their backyard. ''That would be nice to have."

For those folks with Feb. 29 birthdays, put down this article and get ready to party. As life has made abundantly clear by now, you won't see another Feb. 29 until 2008.

Johnny Diaz , whose ideal extra day would involve driving down to Key West, Fla., in his Jeep Wrangler with the top down, can be reached at jodiaz@globe.com, if he hasn't left already.