Obsession: Tips to Becoming a Successful Professional Stalker

Over the long weekend, I had the good fortune of attending a wonderful music festival in Iqaluit called Alianait.  I’ve written the first of four posts on the Nunavut blog, and the whole experience allowed me to come to a realization.

I am a professional stalker.

By no means am I a groupie…I’m just not that good.  But I can certainly hold my own when it comes to tracking down minor celebs – even though some of them probably wouldn’t consider themselves celebs.

It is with great honour then, that I present to you tips for successfully stalking on a professional basis.

1.     Choose attainable targets.  Don’t expect to stalk Christian Bale successfully on your first go – even though this is a worthy goal.  Be reasonable.  And remember, persistence pays off.

Jog on, She.Is.Just.A.Rat! There's nothing to see here... (Source: Babble.com)

2.     Be prepared.  Stalking sometimes requires that you stand outside of a concert venue for many hours in adverse weather conditions.  Bring all necessary medication – particularly your anti-psychotics.

3.     Do your homework.  Trawl the internet for as much information as you can.  The internet has vast amounts of information, even on those who are minimally famous.  Use it to your advantage.  You can drop key bits of this information into conversations you have.  Make sure to let the stalkee know just how much you know about them.  They’ll be impressed and they won’t run away or anything.

4.     Think outside the box.  You may be called to the plate unexpectedly.  Always be ready for some unscheduled stalking, especially if you are somewhere like a music festival, convention or in a place that famous people frequent.  There’s nothing worse or more regretful than watching a famous person from afar leave your sight without having made a move.  Be ready for anything!

5.     Leave your shyness at the door.  This ties in with the previous tip.  There’s no room for being apprehensive about approaching someone in professional stalking.

6.     Don’t forget your camera.  If possible, have a friend nearby to offer to take a picture of you with the stalkee.  Or, become very good at taking self portraits.  The latter option provides one particular benefit:  you have to get exceptionally close to your stalkee to ensure you’ll fit both of you in the picture.  People also tend to not be as frightened of you if you’re giggling over the resulting blurry shot with the stalkee’s head cut off – in the picture, you crazy person…in the picture!

Also, probably a pretty good idea to not make THAT face. (Source: photobombings.com)

7.     Always wait for someone else to approach the person you’re stalking first.  This gives off the appearance that you are not actually stalking them, and you will lessen the chance of having someone call the police on you.

8.     BYOS.  This stands for “bring your own sharpie”.  I accidentally intentionally had one in my backpack at my most recent autograph signing attempt.  Whipping it out of there makes you look like you know what you’re doing.

9.     Get the Twitter. This has seriously upped my stalking game.  If I had Twitter in high school, the amount of man hours I needed to put into stalking would have been significantly reduced.  Facebook can work too, but it requires that the person agree to let you into their life.  With Twitter, you can basically follow anyone.  Figuratively speaking.

10.    Lastly, don’t say “I love you” or propose marriage.  It may be the truth, or something you very much would like to do, but I wouldn’t recommend it.  Your stalkee will immediately start to try rubbing the crazy off of you, and you will have sadly failed.  Unless of course, they actually start rubbing you.  Maybe you might like that.

Who have you stalked successfully?  What other tips can you offer the fledging professional stalker?

Disclaimer:  This post is meant to be humourous.  I do not make a habit of stalking people.

Disclaimer Part 2:  Okay, maybe I make it a habit of stalking some people.  But they have nothing to fear.  I only bother them on Twitter.  I’d never stand outside of their house.  Really.  I mean it.