Brandon Notices

You know how for the past nine years, the government has been running a program to mint special commemorative quarters that feature each of the fifty states? It's been a huge success. This year was supposed to be the tenth and final year of the program, ending with the quarter for Hawaii, but the government passed a bill that will extend the program one more year. In 2009, six new special coins will be minted that feature Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and American Samoa. (source)

I'm not a coin collector (I lost interested after the Delaware quarter), but it is obvious to me that this is both wonderful and horrible news.

It's good news because, yay, more quarters. More quarters means more money! And people like to collect quarters. Especially coin collectors.

It's bad news because of those coin cases that everyone bought to display their quarters. Some of them are expensive, and some of them are cardboard, but all of them were built to house exactly 50 quarters. Now those cases are all totally worthless. They won't be able to hold all the commemorative coins! I predict that when 2009 rolls around, every coin collector in the U.S. will become enraged. We will see riots, murder, looting, suicide, rape, and everything else we associate with angry coin collectors.