Ode to Timmy

For my non-Canadian readers, Tim Horton's is one of our national treasures. The coffee and doughnut chain was founded in 1964 by hockey player Tim Horton who unfortunately died in a car crash ten years later. He never saw just how successful his company would become, i.e., the largest fast food chain in the country. Nowadays you can spot a Timmy's from Kelowna to Kandahar.

Oh, it's more than coffee and doughnuts, my friends. It's a mecca for caffeine-starved, carb-craving Canucks, especially in the winter when we're heading out with a carload of kids to a pre-dawn hockey practice or shuffling off to work in the morning.

We are a loyal nation. We all worship at the altar of Timmy's. Ask any Canadian what "roll up the rim to win" means and he or she can tell you. We all roll up our rims and hope for the big one. Actually, a few years ago, two local families got into a heated battle. One girl found a winning coffee cup in the garbage can at her primary school. She couldn't figure out how to roll up the rim, so she asked an older girl to help her. Turns out the prize under the rim was a car worth $32,000. The older girl's family insisted they deserved the prize. The younger girl's family said something along the lines of "Nuh uh, you don't!

Tim Hortons, like a good mom, said they were not going to get involved and that they had to work things out themselves. Then a lawyer called for a DNA test to be done on the cup. (I swear I'm not making this up. This happened in a community close to my cottage.) The lawyer claimed that his unnamed client had thrown out the cup but was the rightful owner of the prize. Seriously?

What do you think is fair? Who do you think got the car?

Like the mom who heard a lamp crash in the rec room and stomps downstairs to investigate, Tim Hortons reversed their decision to get involved and announced they would award the prize to the younger girl who first found the cup. Yay! Tim Bits for everyone!

On a long, mind-numbing drive along the 401 from Montreal to Toronto, the regular sight of a Timmy's at the end of the exit ramp can lift one's spirits to the point where you can almost hear the celestial choir's voices raised in a big old Hallelujah. And that quick stop to pick up a large double double and a box of Tim Bits will inevitably end with the raised hand of the server (no baristas here) and the benediction "have a nice day." And you will. Oh yes, you will.

Now have a listen to this guy's experience.