#nerdfighter notes

Hi!

I became a Nerdfighter in the Spring or Summer of 2013. I had been on Tumblr for a few months by then and had already found a couple of people to talk with and discovered the world of fandom and shipping though them. I was inspired to watch and read the things they liked, so I went out and bought an English edition of TFiOS, after I’ve seen people’s posts about it.

I’m German, but I really wanted to improve my English during that time and made a point of reading and watching English books and shows in the original version. It was a pain at first, I always had a dictionary on hand and had to look up loads of words. Nowadays, I only have to look up 1-5 words per book but I haven’t dared to read classics like Jane Austen’s books yet.

Anyway, I had bought the book and finally decided to read it a couple of months after the purchase. Then I noticed a little note between the pages, saying:

“Hey Nerdfighter :)

(if you’re not, then go and visit youtube.com/vlogbrothers)

every single sentence in this book is prizeless and you’ll cry a lot :) dftba and have fun! A.N”

I had never found a note in book before and wondered why a stranger would care enough to put it there. I was touched by it but I don’t think I checked out the YouTube channel immediately. Instead I the rest of John’s books and became more and more curious about him, especially because Looking for Alaska sounds like the author has some personal boarding school experience. So I finally looked up vlogbrothers on YouTube. I can’t remember what my first video was, but I’m pretty sure I subscribed a few months before the first Nerdfighter census happened.

I love Nerdfighteria and have written a few of my own Nerdfighter Notes and hidden them in John’s books since. My Pizza John shirts are my favorite thing to wear and I always watch as much of the P4A live stream as I can. Sadly, I couldn’t convince any of my friends to become part of the community and don’t know any other Nerdfighters personally, but I still feel like I’m part of the community because it’s so welcoming.

Here’s the Tumblr post I made after I found the note: http://myshipsailson.tumblr.com/post/50580536717/a-note-i-found-between-pages-122-and-123-of-the

I’m confident that I haven’t thrown the note away, but I can’t find it anymore, so this blurry photo is all I have.

via @myshipsailson

I taped one to the wall of the booth my mom and I sat at at Taco Bell.

I personally handed two to two people; one who sounded like she needed it, and the other just because hey why not.

Three were taped to mirrors in Walmart's bathroom, only to later find one (possibly two, I couldn't tell) in the garbage when I went back there again, which I think was a staff member's doing because one walked in right after I taped them up. (What's wrong with sharing a little love? I mean, I can understand if you didn't want the on the mirrors because then you might have to clean the sticky stuff from the tape off, but don't throw 'em away. Stick 'em somewhere else.)

The other 56 were scattered all across the store. I think I placed near 20 in the back to school section, about 5 to 8 in the women's clothing department, a couple in the office supplies, 3 on copies of tfios (one of which was gone when I circled back around, so yay!), 3 on the little scooters at the front, and the rest were scattered about in places where my mom paused to look at things while I was walking with her. Regrettably, I didn't get any pictures, but oh well. 

And I got my book back today! I let a lady at church borrow it about a month or so ago, because she had just seen tfios, and I was like "hey wanna read about the inspiration for the book?" and she was like "sure" and was just too busy to get through it very fast.

Saw this today in the Hatfield Waterstones.

It made me smile so much!