7 Reasons readers, news has reached us – a mere week after it reached the rest of the world – that Canada has decided to commemorate the wedding of Kate and William by minting (never let it be said that we don’t know technical terms here at 7 Reasons) some commemorative coins. Here they are below these words (or above them if your internet is on the blink), and here are seven reasons not to buy them.
1. Because You Have Eyes. Right about now, you’re probably going through the same thought process that I went through earlier. Oh. My. God. How have I never noticed this before? My monitor has a sapphire stuck to it. But I bought it from a respectable electrical retailer, not from the JJB Poundworld House of Crap. It wasn’t there yesterday. Has Kerry Katona snuck in and accessorised my screen in the night? My God, what if the neighbours see it? Or my in-laws? They’d point at me in the street! I must get it off before people in shell-suits start complimenting me on the bloody thing…but wait…it’s not stuck to the screen at all. It’s on the coin! They’ve stuck it to the groom! The Canadian Mint have pimped Prince William and Pimp-Daddy Wills, he ballin’; he cash-money baby fo’ sho’. Move over, Fiddy Cent, His Royal Highness Twenny Dollars is in da house and all you bitches can suck his bad royal ass.
2. Because It’s Weird. I have been unable to find a satisfactory explanation as to why Canada have taken it upon themselves to pimp Prince William. According to the BBC, the sapphire is there to “symbolise the bride’s engagement ring”. Now, I’m a married man, and my wife has a sapphire engagement ring, but we’re not royal, and, while I appreciate that they do things a little differently to the rest of us, at no point during our engagement did I have to wear a giant version of my wife’s (then fiancé’s) engagement ring affixed to my tie. This is just as well, as women should never marry men who dress like Liberace’s gaudier cousin. Nor should men. Nor should anyone.
3. Because (if you haven’t poked them out while looking at the $20 coin) You Still Have Eyes. The bejewelled coin is gaudy, but the twenty-five cent coin seems to have come straight from the section of the Canadian Mint marked Argos. It’s got a photo of the happy couple on it. A coin. With a photo stuck to it. Because engraving a second coin would apparently be too much trouble for an organisation that works in the field of coin manufacture. I don’t know what things are like in Canada, but where I live, if you find a picture stuck to your coin it’s an advert for a minicab firm, or for a bar with a drinks promotion involving WKD or Carling. Canada: Coins are not photograph albums, and nor are they pieces of jewellery. Coins are coins*.
4. The Free Market. Don’t just take my judgement on these coins. Well, you can, it will save you time if you just choose to agree with me as you won’t have to read the rest of this reason (the more sceptical amongst you will still have to) but the market has spoken. According to the BBC, the twenty dollar coin – the one on the right – will cost you a hundred and five dollars. But its value is still only twenty dollars. So it costs eighty-five dollars more than it’s worth. Or a hundred and five dollars more than it’s worth if you buy it with the lights on. The market has spoken.
5. Because You Can’t Dry Your Royal Wedding Mug With Them. In order to have longevity, a royal souvenir has to have a practical application. In that way, the event is kept in the popular consciousness for a very long time. I’m sure we all have great aunts and grandparents who still regularly dry their coronation mugs with royal wedding tea-towels and many of us learned about modern royal history by seeing those items as children. The only practical application these coins have is that we will learn never to go to Canada (in case they pimp us too) and we’ll probably be able to purchase spinning wheel trims for a Vauxhall Cavalier with them, or one of those singing fish picture things.
6. Because I Beseech You. Don’t buy these coins because – despite the random stones and pictures stuck to them – they’re still coins. And where do all coins end up? Yes, in my house down the back of the sofa. Absolutely all coins end up in that sofa, and we don’t want them. We have an innocent child in the house that we’re trying to protect from seeing such things. Please, please don’t buy them!
7. What! Why are you still here? Do you really need a seventh reason? Fine, in that case, go back to the top of the page and look at them again then! O Canada, what have you done?
*To coin a phrase.
