A story that has to be read to be believed: The U.S. government was investigating claims of a top secret Canadian “spy coin” that we crafty Canadians were allegedly planting in the pockets of U.S. government contractors to track their locations, record their conversations, signal the extraterrestrials to commence invasion, devalue the American currency…or something like that. (I may have made up a few of those)

Well done, the game is up. You caught us!

The culprit to the American mystery was our top secret “Poppy Quarter“, a coin put into circulation in 2004 in commemoration of the 117,000 Canadians killed in World War I, WWII and other conflicts. The poppy is our symbol of Remembrance.

“So how did these advanced nanotechnology tracking devices get into my pocket?” they ask. Reports were written. Investigations launched. It’s a little something we like to call: “making change”…obviously a radical Canadian concept you’re not so familiar with.

Let me explain: we rely on your secret agents crossing the border to buy coffee and donuts at Tim Hortons. Our Tim’s operatives mix the tracking coins with regular ones when making change for your greenbacks (your agents are overwhelmed by the rainbow hues of our currency and don’t notice anything “amiss” until it’s too late). Coins embedded in your agents’ pockets, we can track their positions, so please…just tell them not to make any 25-cent pay phone calls, or to feel overly generous should they pass a wishing well. That would, uh, throw off our carefully-laid evil plans.

N.B.: Tim’s was the exclusive distributor to the coin when it initially launched — So go ahead and R-r-r-roll up the rim to be tracked by our supercoins, which are uplinked to a massive network (four) of Anik spy satellites. And get this: did you know that “Anik” means “little brother” in Inuit? That’s right…Little Canadian Brother is watching youuuuu… (cue paranoid Twilight Zone music)

But the 2004 Poppy Quarter is old news. In the spy world, things change fast. The Canadian Mint has just completed a top secret project (read all about it here) to create the largest gold coin ever! It has a face value of $1 million (though the solid gold is worth over $2 million at today’s prices, and will actually sell for about $3 million!), and weighs 100kg. (that’s 220lbs for our agent friends from down south) Just think of the spy technology we were able to pack into something the size of a very thick pizza! Think of it…and be afraid…