We’ve already established that I’m a giver.

When trollers and skeeves send rude, poorly-written emails, I do them the favor of correcting their grammar. It’s a service I’m proud to provide.

When my friends need something, I’m there for them.

One of the best people I’ve ever known (and will continue to know, especially after this gift) through the magical internet is Momo Fali. Though that’s not her God-given name, it’s how she’s known by me and the collective. Or if your name is Ree, you know her by your given name for her: Meemo Ferly, Mommo Farts, Merlin Ferlin, etc.

Momo is crazy Awesome.

Mishi, Momo, & Me meeting for the first time at BlogHer '09 and instantly falling in love.

In the words of the great wordsmith, Amy Turn Sharp,

I need your light. You produce a ton. Shine it. xo

Momo has that light from which I feed.

OK, not literally feed from her light like a suckling pig from a teat, but Momo’s infectious goodness permeates.

OK OK, now it sounds like she has some kind of unpronounceable skin disease, of which I can neither confirm nor deny.

My point: Momo, or Diane as very few people know her, is one of my most favorite people ever.

Momo is going through a crappy time, and through that crappy time, she’s finding the light. In her words, the light on which she is focusing through this crappy time:

I (wish) was in Fiji with a raft and a fancy drink and I would see my muse walking toward me on the beach with a Macbook in hand.

I can’t yet fund a trip to Fiji for you, complete with a (what I would consider a fine-looking man meat) muse.

But I do have time to search for photos of an equivalent substitute.

Momo, this is what I do for you:

You, friend, are welcome.

I love you dearly, and most especially Woundy, your arrow-fight battle scar.

image copyright Rob Lang

© Angie [A Whole Lot of Nothing] for A Whole Lot of Nothing • Your Favorite Blog, 2012. | Permalink | 19 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: beach, Friends, man, momo fali, nude, photo

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I don’t often brag about living in Florida. Except I’m lying. Going to the beach in December is pretty effing Awesome.

Just be glad I didn’t take a picture of the margarita I drank while the sun set over the Gulf.

I’m slightly jealous of everyone else’s cooler weather. And I’m definitely jealous of everyone else’s summer weather. But days like today are when I feel it’s appropriate to flaunt my state.

© Angie [A Whole Lot of Nothing] for A Whole Lot of Nothing • Your Favorite Blog, 2011. | Permalink | 3 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: anna, beach, claire, florida, gulf of mexico, nolan, paige, photos, sunset, tampa

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The beach, it calls my name. I grew up 5 miles away the way the mythical crow flies from the best beach in the US, yet as a teen I was too self-conscious about my body to go to the beach. Plus, my mom was always, “You’ll get sand in your crack!” and “You don’t want to go ALL THE WAY DOWN THERE, do you?” I’m still not sure if she was referring to my crack or the beach.

So what if it was a 30-minute drive around and through traffic lights to get to the beach before the bridge opened during my 11th grade year? Add in the fact that I was super lazy even way back in my rearing years to pack up myself and stuff and lay out in the stupid heat just to get a sand in my crack, I didn’t go to the beach very often when it was out my figurative back door.

Living in Orlando affords us options when it comes to visiting the beaches. We have Cocoa Beach 25 minutes to our east and Tampa Bay/St Pete Beach 2 hours to our west-ish. We went to Cocoa Beach last summer with the girls, and we vowed we would never go there again. Rather than finding sugar-white sand in our cracks, we had to dig out black sand. Black sand and cracks don’t mix. We’re admitted beach snobs with our affinity for white sandy beaches and turquoise water with actual waves as we look down on the dark sand and murky water and 100s of Euromen banana hammocks.

Since having the children reach the age of consenting to what we mold their minds into thinking, I plan to spend several days of our summer vacation on the beach with my girls. It’s my plan to tweak their wee brains into Beach Bunnies who will want to go to the beach with me, but only to beaches that meet our high expectations.

It won’t be hard brainwashing them to think that this is the best way to beach.

© Angie [A Whole Lot of Nothing] for A Whole Lot of Nothing • Your Favorite Blog, 2011. | Permalink | 7 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: beach, destin, florida, kids, Vacation, white sand

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From time to time, my brain ceases to function. It’s not really anything that’s predictable or fixable. It really just stops being creative.

I’m not a monkey. I can’t bring the funny just by putting my finger up my ass then smelling it.
bee tee dub: if you have a video of that, please send.

For me, being creative is work. I’m no artiste or magical wizard with a pen or crafty son-of-a-bitch. That work of being creative with my keyboard ebbs and flows like the waves of my gushing menses.

You never know when it’s gonna happen.
if patrick didn’t have the snip, i’d think i was pregnant every single month with the way my menstrual cycle calendars.

Aren’t you glad you know so much about me?

“Hi, my name is Angie, and I like warm fudge brownies, endless hours of TV-watching, the beach, and my period is unpredictable.”

I also write way too many blog posts about how my brain doesn’t work. You’d think I’d get the hint that I should just write and quit complaining, but now I’m 181 words into this post, it’s 8:10 on a Tuesday night, and this is the first productive thing I’ve done today.

Unless you count ordering my cheeseburger with gouda instead of the standard American. THAT took some thought and experience in knowing my cheeses.

Today was a #couchtozeroK day with #bumknee and really, my knee hasn’t felt better in over a week. That should tell me that “hey, dumbshit, you should do more “lazy” and do less “doing” cause your #bumknee actually feels good when you do nothing.”

I got out yesterday to the beach and stayed on the deck at the bar (mmmm… margarita on the beach) while my mom took my girls to the shoreline so they could play at my beach in my Gulf. I was able to get some amazing shots of the water and the sand and the whole beach from my pedestal.

(no, that’s not oil in the water – it’s June Grass seaweed. still gross, but safe for human touch.)

Tomorrow, Tara is picking me up for an early-morning date to the beach then breakfast at The Donut Hole. Any restaurant with the words “donut” and “hole” in the name was made just for me. I hope to be inspired by the morning light (note: not SUNRISE light) and the donuts (PLURAL) in my belly.

What inspires you to create magic in my pants? Can you lend me your inspiration? Or do I just need to suck it up that’swhatshesaid and quit my whining?

© Angie [A Whole Lot of Nothing] for A Whole Lot of Nothing • Your Favorite Blog, 2010. | Permalink | 10 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: beach, bumknee, productive

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My left knee is still messed up. I have an MRI scheduled for June 21. Happy early birthday, Patrick!

When I take anti-inflammatories and darvoset, it feels a bit better, but only a bit. It still hurts like a mo’fo when I pick it up off the ground. You know, like when I do ANYTHING.

My girls were already going to my parent’s house for the week because I was going to Anissa’s (*sob*), so now I’m going up there with them so my mom can take care of all three of us. I’ll be the one on the couch being served sammiches and pie.

You think I’m joking.

She’s a good mom like that.

My mom can beat up your mom in a World’s Best Mom pageant. She’d kill you with her passive-aggressive statements and near-to-tears smile.

They live just across the inter-coastal from Destin, FL where tar balls and oil sheen has been spotted, but for now, it’s 99% clear on the beach. That is MY beach.

And of course, with my bum knee, I can’t hobble my way out to the sand without possibly tweaking my knee even more.

But I must go there. I MUST see it before it’s gone. As much as I’d like to think it wouldn’t and couldn’t happen, there’s an extremely likely possibility that MY beach will be ruined for years.

I must go and see it, photograph it, smell it, feel it.

Be there.

I will find a good place to go and be there without walking too far on my bum* knee.

That or I’ll tell myself, “It will be worth it to completely wreck my knee for getting to spend time on my beach with my girls.”

___ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___

*Why is it that I keep wanting to add a “b” or another “m” to the end of bum? Stupid English language and its weird sometimes rules.

© Angie [A Whole Lot of Nothing] for A Whole Lot of Nothing • Your Favorite Blog, 2010. | Permalink | 13 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: beach, injury, knee

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The fabulousness combined of Maria Melee, Caroline Morningside Mom, and Deb on the Rox have put together a link-up of all people who love the Gulf of Mexico. Having lived across the intercoastal from the Gulf until I was 18 and visit several times a year, I can profess my love for the greatest beaches in the world.

Totally award-winning. Like, for serious. Actual awards.

I wrote a post yesterday for one of my other gigs about the oil spill and its affect on tourism and how hotels and beaches are safe and welcoming visitors. Just thinking about the beach being covered in sludge made me tear up and miss it even more.

THIS, is MY beach:

Don’t fruck with my beach. Kids eat that sand.

© Angie [A Whole Lot of Nothing] for A Whole Lot of Nothing • Your Favorite Blog, 2010. | Permalink | 15 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: beach, gulf of mexico, oil spill, photos

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This past weekend, the fabulous, sexy, hot mama, super dooper awesome Shauna Glenn let me and my family stay at her beach house.

Her. Vacation. Beach. House.

damn. i know.

It’s flat out awesome.

I’m buying a TV for the living room (the ONLY thing missing) & I’m moving in. I mean, c’mon. It totally matches my blog design colors. It’s fate.

© Angie [A Whole Lot of Nothing] for A Whole Lot of Nothing • Your Favorite Blog, 2009. | Permalink | 34 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: beach, florida, house, shauna glenn

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Was here earlier today

(This was taken in March, but I didn’t get out my camera today and there would have been about 30 people in the pic anyway, so you get this one and you’ll like it.)

Am feeling this

(This was taken in May at the Magic Kingdom, but again, I didn’t take my camera out today, so you get a picture of serenity NOW.)

I’m feeling groooooovy.

You?

© Angie [A Whole Lot of Nothing] for A Whole Lot of Nothing • Your Favorite Blog, 2009. | Permalink | 9 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: beach, destin, Disney World, magic kingdom, sunset

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Yup. I’m a show off.

You would be, too, if you had these girls on this beach at this time.

Breath-taking.

© Angie [A Whole Lot of Nothing] for A Whole Lot of Nothing • Your Favorite Blog, 2009. | Permalink | 7 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: beach, florida, ft walton beach, girls, photograph, sunset

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For all the fabulosity of Weekly Winners, visit the hotness, Sarcastic Mom.

Wedding at St Augustine beach:

© Angie [A Whole Lot of Nothing] for A Whole Lot of Nothing • Your Favorite Blog, 2009. | Permalink | 23 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: beach, Disney World, epcot, photograph, st augustine

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