You can name and/or recognize half or more of the AKB48 research students or H!P Eggs. I couldn’t even name anybody in AKB48 proper, except for Megumi Ohori because of her solo single.  

You own at least 10 photos of your favorite idol. Guilty as charged!

You buy t-shirts advertising your favorite idol/idol group and wear them on a regular basis. If you’re a man 25+, you don’t feel any regret or embarrassment about this. Regrettably innocent. Japan doesn’t seem to make their shirts in American XL size, otherwise I’d have at least one Morning Musume shirt and one Reina Tanaka shirt.

You know all of your favorite idol’s stats by heart. I know Reina Tanaka’s birthday, where she’s from, and what her first single with the band was. Beyond that, fuggedaboutit.

Whenever anyone insults your favorite idol or idol group, you immediately come to their defense… even if you know you’re b.s.ing half your compliments. (i.e. “They’re good singers!” “She can dance well!” “She has more personality than [insert some famous TV personality here]” “They’re NOT ugly!”) For one thing, I don’t bullshit my compliments when it comes to J-Pop. Other than that, guilty as charged, especially where my fiancée is concerned. All that having been said, anyone in MoMusu could run circles around [name of a certain teen pop/TV star deleted as I vowed never to mention her name on this blog ever again].

You have spent more than you make a day on idol goods. Guilty!

You can recognize all of your favorite idols’ voices. Yep.

You have almost a stalkerish obsession with wanting to meet them or even just see them in person. I definitely don’t know about stalkerish obsession, but let’s be fucking blunt: Morning Musume are my favorite band along with Iggy Pop & The Stooges, and since I’ve gotten to see the Stooges play live last year in what was the best fucking concert I’ve ever seen in my life, I need to get my ass to Japan someday so that I can complete that equation! If I got to MEET them, I’d probably be extremely fucking nervous.

You hear someone say something that remotely sounds like your favorite idol’s name and you immediately assume they’re also a wota. Let’s just say that it doesn’t help that Reina is also a common name for Latin females!

You heavily anticipate any news from your idol. Guilty.

You have sent fan-mail. Honestly, I wouldn’t know where to send them fan mail.

Your favorite idol appears in your dreams more than once. Hasn’t happened with Reina Tanaka yet, but I do remember a dream where I was supposed to be going away somewhere the next day and I’m in a room with my parents and Mika Todd. 

You have wondered what would happen if your idol dated you. (Mainly for guys, but if we include Johnnys here…) Actually, I haven’t wondered what a date with Reina would be like. A record-shopping trip with Reina would be quite interesting, though…

Your husband/wife/boyfriend/girlfriend/immediate family has learned to deal with your obsession long ago. Perhaps.

If your favorite idol is suspended/fired/retired/graduated/has no work with their agency/other you check more than two sources of possible info everyday and accept any rumors about his/her return to be true immediately. Um, seriously, I’m trying to put what happened with Ai Kago out of my mind, but…

You have at least 3 photobooks or DVDs of your favorite idol. To date, four photobooks and two DVDs of Reina.

You could colorcode a song sung by AKB48 O.o (I’m afraid of those who can!) I couldn’t even colorcode a song sung by MoMusu!

You do fandubs, cosplays, or fandances of your favorite idol or idol group. This would be fellow Cancerian wota Vee’s department. Personally, on a related note, I’m surprised I haven’t sat down with my guitar and figured out the chord changes to MoMusu songs!

You make birthday and worship posts on a blog/forum. Guilty in the first degree – hell, I started So Hot She Shits Fire on Reina’s 18^th birthday and did birthday posts that day on MotokoAoyama.com and YODC as well.

You don’t take the cheap route and buy your idol’s songs from iTunes or another mp3 site, you spend the money to order every edition of the CD/DVD. Unfortunately, I’ve taken the impatient route and downloaded a few things from either iTunes or Hello-Online.org’s tracker when the mail service for an advance order was way too slow for my liking. 

I didn’t see any full episodes, only clips (many of those having only Reina Tanaka in them, for reasons obvious only to longtime readers of MotokoAoyama.com (both versions) and SHSSF. From what I read of descriptions of the show, it seemed to get sillier and sillier with every episode. Didn’t bother me though.

It wasn’t the talent that was the problem with the show – Morning Musume still continue to sell records, having not missed the Oricon Top 10 in their entire history. It was the situations they found themselves in. Their previous program, Hello! Morning, had the group in a bigger variety of situations both in and out of the studio. HaroMoni@ had them stuck in a TV studio being bossed around by a puppet in a crown and a diaper.

Morning Musume and Up-Front Works will, no doubt, have a new TV outlet to replace HaroMoni@. With the band still a priority for UFW, that’s pretty much a given, and I wouldn’t be surprised if UFW had a contingency plan in place once they saw the writing on the wall. I would also not be surprised if an announcement on MoMusu’s replacement program came before HaroMoni@’s last episode airs at the end of September.

The only real disadvantage I can see, from my point of view, is that the end of HaroMoni@ also means the end of eyecandy of my favorite MoMusu wearing those rather sexy cat ears.