Woke up to a text from my uncle today that reminded me of a fad that swept Canada back when we had paper bills.
It was called spocking and it was the practice of taking a five dollar bill and turning Wilfred Laurier into Spock with a ballpoint pen. I don’t know who did it first, but someone realized that the Canadian prime minister during World War One looked like Leonard Nimoy if you held your head right.
Best part is that these Spock’d bills were still legal tender. Everyone seemed to love it except of course for the mint and the bank of Canada. There were also some general population narcs who found it to be disrespectful towards the long dead prime minister. However, nerds and people with good senses of humour liked it, and Spocking reached a high watermark shortly after we got our new fives as a tribute to the beloved character after Nimoy’s death in 2015. By that point, I’d been Spocking bills for a while, so any paper five I came into contact with; you best know I was Spocking.
The new fives were a little harder to Spock, given that they were made of plastic and Laurier looked a little less like Leonard Nimoy in the picture they used.
As you can see, it’s not quite right, so as paper fives slowly left circulation, as did Spocking. It’s a unique, fun moment in Canadian history that I thought was worth sharing.
ADDITION: I found this post in my drafts today and it was a total gut punch because my uncle I talked about in the beginning of this post passed away tragically a few days ago. I toyed with not posting this Goon’s Heritage Moment, but I’ve obviously decided to post it.
I visited my uncle when I was a young teenager and I had a paper five dollar bill in my possession. I excitedly turned it into Spock, much to my uncle’s amusement, and he paid me ten dollars for it after I was done. I found out about a month ago that my uncle had the bill I Spocked in his wallet for nearly ten years, and he loved showing it to people. Closer to the end of is life, he put it up so he could always see it. I feel it’s only appropriate for me to post this fun piece of Canadiana to honour his memory. I know that my Spocked five dollar bill brought him joy on his harder days, so I hope this story can bring you all a bit of joy. If anything, text someone you love today to let them know what you’re up to and how much you love them. A text like that can mean more than you’ll ever know.
Live long and prosper, gang: that’s an order. If not for me, for my uncle Jonathan.
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I've been wanting to draw these old ocs i had like 3 years ago for forever now because I still liked their colors a lot, but I kept not coming up with pictures of them that I liked...Well I'll have to settle for this one now. Fun trivia is that I literally never named them this whole time. At this point the fact that they're impossible to refer to at all is kind of just how it is forever.
^ anyway Biting Attack
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