Do you ever take notes while playing IF? I had heard of this being somewhat common back in the earlier years of IF. But now with the internet the way it is, I’m not sure how useful traditional note taking really is. I know designers often take and keep notes, usually on the computer and sometimes on paper, but I don’t know about players.
Bonus points if you show us pictures or examples of your notes. 
I tend to not take notes as a rule unless some kind of numeric code pops up and I’ll jot it down. If a game has an extensive map and I’m really into it, I might take notes, but most authors are discouraged from writing those types of games anymore due to the prevalent tastes.
One helpful thing that I haven’t done myself cause I run a Mac, is you can download and use Trizbort and it will map the game as you go based on your live transcript.
I use Google Drive tables with multiple tabs for different types of notes - items, problems to solve, npc topics …
For smaller games I just type few notes on paper, when necessary.
and Trizbort for mapping. It is Windows only, but runs in Wine on Linux (and possibly Mac)
I never take notes unless I have to remember a number in a game to open a safe or something. Then I just scribble that down.
I think that Delightful Wallpaper is the only game I’ve ever fully mapped on paper.
Yes, I do take notes. Mostly it’s just a few words about what I like and dislike about the game (including first impressions, thoughts about various aspects of the game as I’m playing, and some final thoughts). I find this useful both for deciding on a final rating (for the IFComp or IFDB) and for later looking up what I thought about a game.
I also note potentially useful/important information from the game, e.g. names of the various NPCs and their relation to the PC, clues given, useful commands mentioned in ‘about’ &c. I almost never draw maps. I guess I’m not very good at navigating, but even for games that really require them, I try to get by without drawing maps; I just struggle along. (And if I feel I really need to draw a map, I use pen and paper.)
For writing the notes, I use a simple text editor (Kate on Linux) that I have open at the same time as the game. About 40% of my screen is covered by the editor and 60% by the game (I use Gargoyle as my interpreter, with a huge font size and short (60 character) line lengths). I use a dark background in the editor, so that it feels less distracting and more like ‘background’.
