first and foremost i would like to start this off by mentioning this: i encountered my first nerd star in a topic about a very grief subject: i am terribly sorry to hear about Cleveland, if you are from Cleveland i hope you stay safe and my thoughts are with the victims of this horrible crime

some of you may say 'hey, why would you even make a post about something as insignificant as getting your pixel star all-blue on a videogame forum?'; some may say 'ha i got 3 and a half stars already now THAT is an accomplishment and yours is nothing'; some of you may say 'man, i wish i had my 1st/2nd/3rd nerdstar already (and i feel you the most)'. i'll try not to bring my whole tf2 career here but just say that i have been around this forum for quite a while even before i first signed up back in 2014

i was merely a lurker at that time, and for a long while i tried not to talk much but rather listen to what others saying: who is who on these forums, the idea of up/downfrags, nerdstars and all the technical shenanigans, reading through lots of meta-discussion, lots of shitposts on one hand, but on the other hand also reading lots of in-depth analysis about the game we all playing (or used to play) and of course zillion threads, posts and comments about all kinds of things - from music to politics to news to studying to LIFE overall

my first priority throughout my 'forum career' - for lack of a better term - was to make sure i bring up the most to the discussion: i restrained myself from posting multiple times in the same threads, tried not to make lots of threads themselves, even knowing this is the best way to grind internet points around these parts: instead of that i tried to be as funny, as knowledgeable, as honest and as supportive as i possibly can in this format of connecting with other people. not always have i succeeded and sometimes i broke my own rules but 'let he who is without sin cast the first stone' - at times in order to make ourselves better as a person we have got to see what it is like to make mistakes

i am using this topic and this event - on sight an incredibly minor one in a context of this forum even, not talking about OP's life - to say THANK YOU to people i have met while playing this tf2 game whom now i can call my friends, and to those unnamed ones who i see here for bringing joy to my life with each funny post or incredibly deep and tearful message they produce on almost daily basis on this forum. i quit tf2 last summer and for some it is just a phase that usually ends two weeks after the start (hi Lupus). for me it meant to let go of a very old routine and also saying goodbye to most of my friends who i played with for months and years. these forums - and also Twitch chats - helped me fill this small - on a global scale of life - void in my heart that i had after quitting with the joy of communicating with people from all parts of the world and still feeling like i belong to this massive and beloved community of tf2 players. recently i have reckoned that not everything is certain in our life; i am glad i managed to make tf2 one of a few certain things in my life that i know will be around further down the line

i will still keep posting here, will try to make my forum posts as thoughtful as before and try to expand my knowledge about everything besides tf2 and what this forum had taught me already

i remember sitting with spammyh, another fellow forum user, in some finnish eatery and noticing how many nerdstars he had on tf.tv. there i thought: 'man there is still something for me to achieve'. hopefully there will be one and a half and two and more stars in the future, for now though i would love to mention this small achievement of mine and those who helped me getting it

if you managed to read this to the end - thank you, sorry for taking your time and apologize for grammar/structure mistakes (england es me double dialect), hope you have a fantastic day and see you on forums!

wholeheartedly yours,
Boris A. aka WRU aka twitch.tv/desudeusused