Finally, they are here!!! There is a ridiculous amount of photos on my picasa site: http://picasaweb.google.com/laura.pugmire . Just phase 1 since I still need to compile photos from the wedding day, but you can find an album of The Honeymoon and also our Trek West up there, which are quite fun. Here is a sampler:
So. I know it's been a while. A LONG while. But I have happy news: I am back!!! We got internet this morning and it is glorious! So... soon to come:
I'm moving!
See details: http://jasonity.blogspot.com/2008/06/jeeoooooorrrb.html
So sad to say goodbye to Boston.
SO happy for Jason.
p.s. Thanks to all of your for your wonderful advice. I am taking extensive notes.
So. One month from today I will be getting married.
BIZARRO.
One month from right NOW I will probably be laying in my bed, staring at the ceiling, wondering what I am getting myself into, but also probably so excited I could pee my pajamas.
Married friends: do you remember what this felt like? A month away and not sure if you have time to do everything and get it done right? Any words of wisdom for the experientially-impaired? How do I keep sane in my last month of engagement?
Not-so-married friends: you know this feeling of having WAY too much to do and WAY too little time to do it in? How do you, in particular, find balance?
I read this quote the other day: "Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art of leaving things undone. The wisdom in life consists in the elimination of the non-essential."
All: I loved this quote, mostly because it's something I strive for but don't quite achieve. How do you learn to let go of things and leave them for another day? How do I decide what's essential and what's not? How do I let go of guilt when I don't get all the things done that I wanted to or felt like I should for that day?
Virtual penny for your thoughts.
I read this article online today... super good!
Check it:
http://www.realsimple.com/realsimple/package/0,21861,1734800-1809876,00.html
And then go have a bunch of yogurt pretzels.
That was my happiness package of the day.
DELICIOUS.
A few months ago, one of my coworkers told me about how when he and his friends get smashed, they try to make sure one of them is not super drunk so that he can prevent the others from "drunk calling" their ex-girlfriends or girls that they have crushes on and saying stuff that is ridiculous.
I could've used one of those preventative persons last week.
Tiredness and I make a dynamic combo. After a couple weeks of going to bed late and getting up early, I was both sick and tired. One night I got home late--again--and Jason and I decided it was too late to try to see each other, so we read scriptures over the phone and then I went to bed. I say "we read scriptures" but I mostly fell asleep on the phone--both while Jason was reading and while I was reading. Yes, I fell asleep reading aloud. Incredible. I was wasted.
We said good night, apparently (I have no memory of this) and I fell asleep for realz, with my light on as always. An hour later, Jason looks at his phone and it is on silent but ringing, and it's me calling. It's 1:04 in the morning. He answers: "Hello?" I say an exuberant but slurred "Good MOHRGNING!" He's like, "Um, what do you need? Are you okay?" - totally confused as to why I am calling and not saying anything. I respond, "Mumble mumble mumble mumble." Jason: "Um, what?" Me: "Mumble mummbbblle..." Jason instructed me to go back to bed. "Okay," I say. "Bye!" He looks at his phone confusedly and replies, "Bye..." waits for me to hang up... I do. Conversation over.
The best part is that I remember about 2 seconds of this experience. I remember being on the phone and saying "Good morning." I must have dreamed that it was the next morning and Jason was calling me to wake me up, as usual... but then, how did I grab my phone, open it, and call him? UNKNOWN, my friends. The mystery of being drunk that will never be solved. I have made my first drunk phone call. Drunk on lack of sleep. Drunk on LOVE. Hahahahahaha. I'm a dork.
But it does make for a really funny story.
Yup. Tis true. Jason gave me the best present for my birthday yesterday: he gave me his heart. (aghhhh, CHEEEEEESY!)
He also gave me a beautiful ring! Here are some photos:
J and I on Sunday afternoon. Oh, sunshine! 
This is my favorite picture EVER of my sister Melissa and her husband Ammón. I LOVE them. 
Yay, family! Mom, Grandma, Melissa, Ammón, Dad, Me. Congrats Meliss! 
I LOVE THIS PICTURE. My grandma adores Jason.
Aw, we so cute. :)
My goodly parents. They are rad.
Ma girlz... Mad Mordigan and Tawni.
And a little of the deliciousness that is Cafe Rio.
Love you ladies, thanks for makin time.
... but I haven't had time yet. But I will! Totally forthcoming. In the meantime, here are my thoughts from today, copied from an email to a friend.
It's interesting... on the mission your sense of purpose is keen; you know clearly what you're supposed to be doing and there are very clear ways of identifying if you are completing your mission or not. It gives you a nice feeling of accomplishment at the end of the day to know that you did your best and obeyed all the rules and put all the little pieces in to make the perfect missionary day. Yet that time as a full-time missionary is just preparatory; as the mission progresses and when we return home, we have to start to learn to not live by checklists and instead to live by the Spirit. There is no longer anyone telling us what our mission is--we now have to discover it by revelation, and find out if we're fulfilling it by acts of faith and the later confirmation that what we've done is right. This was really hard for me when I got home. I wanted the checklist! I wanted someone to just tell me what to do, and boy howdy would I do it. I'd do it wholeheartedly, and especially if it involved teaching the gospel all day and serving people. The Lord now needed me to prepare for and find my new mission, however: He needed me to educate myself so that I could better serve Him. He needed me to be lonely a few hundred times so that I could better empathize with those whose hands hang down. He needed me to choose for myself a career path so that I could advise my children on how to do it for themselves later, so that I could find my passion on my own and feel the accomplishment of discovering it for myself and not the feeling of being forced into a career and resenting the Lord on the bad days for having "made" me do something I didn't like, and He needed me to learn to make important decisions on my own, because He's training me to be like Him, and He makes these kinds of decisions all the time. So gradually I'm starting to feel like my life's mission is as beautiful as my full-time mission was, even though it taxes me and tests me just as my mission constantly did, though in different ways. Once we've shown the Lord we want to be obedient to Him and to do His work, He trusts us to make of our lives a masterpiece, as Elder Wirthlin said, and to do many good things of our own free will. He knows we'll do good things, so He just lets us choose what we will, because He knows it will be awesome and that we won't forget to counsel with Him and listen to His gentle guidance.