I found a 'red poppy' quarter in my change today.

[trupa]

erm… if I may?

Hi Wombat, don’t worry about EatsCrayons, she’ll (I think I remember Eats is a she) be fine…

It may seem a bit odd, but Tim’s, or Timmie’s, seems to have found a place in how Canadians define our contry. You know how they say “as american as Mom and Apple Pie”? Well, Tim Hortons seems to have become our apple pie. It’s become a national symbol, kind of like McDonals and Coke are symbols of the US, except that many Canadians have a deep, warm-fuzzy love for the place. Yes, I know it’s a donut shop. What can I say. I sort of have it too, even though I mostly get my bean from the decidedly not Canadian Starbuck’s now.

When you order cofee at Tim’s, you must specify the amount of cream and sugar, which they put in for you. The “large double-double” has been a driving force in making the infrastructure of this country continue working, especially in times of snow-storms or adversity. It is the currency with which countless favours are repaid, and over which advice is sought, and sorrows comforted .

They made a commercial a few years back, where they showed a Canadian destroyer on lonely vigil in the Persian gulf during the first gulf war, with homesick Candian sailors being comforted by an “emergency” shipment of Tim’s coffee. It kinda made me want to cry, sing O’Canada, salute the flag, etc. all at once(*). Rather unusual sentiments for a Canadian… (Well, maybe except at the start of hockey games or during the Olympics)

I guess in a sort of acknowledgement of this, the government made them the only other source of these remembrance day coins.

So that’s what’s Tim Hortons. Yeah, just a donut shop, but still a lot more…

(*) well that one but also the one where the kids bring back a double-double for his granfather who’s been watering the backyard skating rink in the cold of the night too…I’m such a sap for their commercials.

[trupa]

BTW, InvisibleWombat, should your quest for a remembrance day Canadian quarter bring you all the way up to Calgary from your Montana plains, I, and other Calgary dopers, I’m sure, would be happy to treat you to a large double-double and a cruller, or walnut-crunch, in honour of international relations and Doper solidarity.

[Casey1505]

Any Canadian Dopers willing to trade a poppy quarter for one each of the 2004 Westward Journey Nickel Series?

[cowgirl]

@trupa

BTW, InvisibleWombat, should your quest for a remembrance day Canadian quarter bring you all the way up to Calgary from your Montana plains, I, and other Calgary dopers, I’m sure, would be happy to treat you to a large double-double and a cruller, or walnut-crunch, in honour of international relations and Doper solidarity.

Ahh … International peace through donuts and coffee. Imagine what we could accomplish if our peacekeepers were armed with Timbits.

I love Canada.

[matt_mcl]

@trupa

When you order cofee at Tim’s, you must specify the amount of cream and sugar, which they put in for you. The “large double-double” has been a driving force in making the infrastructure of this country continue working, especially in times of snow-storms or adversity. It is the currency with which countless favours are repaid, and over which advice is sought, and sorrows comforted .

That, and it’s fucking liquid crack cocaine. I don’t know what they put in that coffee, but it’s probably illegal in the US. If I had syringes, I would mainline it.

[Antigen]

@trupa

well that one but also the one where the kids bring back a double-double for his granfather who’s been watering the backyard skating rink in the cold of the night too…I’m such a sap for their commercials

It was his neighbor, which makes it even more of a warm fuzzy commercial. Their ads make me cry - I know that if I ever leave Canada I’ll need friends to send me Tim Hortons care packages, and I’ll get all emotional when I open them.

I weep for all the people in this world who will never taste the beautiful caffeinated goodness which is a Tim Hortons coffee.

matt_mcl, I think they should take your words and make their new slogan “Tim Hortons coffee. If I had syringes, I would mainline it.”

@Casey1505

Any Canadian Dopers willing to trade a poppy quarter for one each of the 2004 Westward Journey Nickel Series?

Sure thing! I have a couple of extras. Contact me by e-mail and we’ll figure something out.

[UncleBeer]

I thought it was some kind of ionized (?) metal.

If anodized was the word you were searching for, then the metal would have to be aluminum. The anodization process works only on aluminum.

The word you were searching for was anodized. Anodizing is a plating process.

Not primarily. It’s more of a surface conversion process and it’s done in an electrolyte bath. During the conversion, aluminum oxide builds up - to a pretty minor extent. 0.2 - 0.7 thousandths of an inch for sulphuric or chromic anodizing. But you can build up to .002 inches with the hard anodizing process. It this one that can be colored and that most people are familiar with.

[Gary_Robson]

@trupa

BTW, InvisibleWombat, should your quest for a remembrance day Canadian quarter bring you all the way up to Calgary from your Montana plains, I, and other Calgary dopers, I’m sure, would be happy to treat you to a large double-double and a cruller, or walnut-crunch, in honour of international relations and Doper solidarity.

I will have to remember that offer next time I make the journey north. I love the Canadian rockies every bit as much as the U.S. rockies, and dear ol’ Dad was a Canadian, so I guess there’s a bit of it in my blood.

Mayhaps, to do my part to help international relations, I’ll have to bring along some real American beer as we brew it around here. That may help refute the widely-held belief that we all drink Budweiser and other tasteless yellowish bubble-water.

And I really don’t think Canada needs a new name for the quarter. Just stop producing the old ones and make all Poppies instead. Then $3.75 would be a loonie, a twoonie, and three poppies.