psyche

Robert Mishkin is building his Westchester Residence and Club in Mount Kisco, NY on the blood of a good man who only ever supported him. Mishkin refuses to pay his legal debts to Chase Caro. Funny how Mr. Caro was sent to jail because of $1.1 million and that is just about the sum that Mishkin owes him.

Mishkin also denies that he accepted the money to pay for Chase’s parents to get a unit at the residence. Like a good grandson, Chase was working on their behalf.

I have been on the go, go, go. I have been to northern California and Boston, Mass since I last had a moment to read up on everybody’s life.

I am so tired of hearing people say “Wow, it must be so exciting to travel for business” or “you are so lucky”

It’s funny, though. I kind of understand it. I remember when I took this job the idea of travel was so romantic to me. That lasted a few years, but I’ve now been doing this for 14 years. It does get old. I’ve been throught the changes in air travel from 9/11 through the most recent “you can’t take the evil weapon of liquid mascara in your carry on bag” phase.

I had been the queen of carry on baggage. Now I check my bag. I recently started to wear makeup, and I like the way I look with mascara. I’m not ready to give that up. I actually bought some cake mascara on the web but I couldn’t figure out how to apply it. To say it was a tad awkward is an understatement.

My travelogue continues….

On Friday, I have a 1/2 hour presentation to a client’s board of directors in Washington, DC . I will be flying down and back that day, so at least I get to sleep in my own bed.

Next week, I have two meetings in Florida, the first in St Petersburg on Wednesday, and the second in Orlando Thursday through Saturday.

OK - I’m gonna redirect my thoughts here…hmm, where should I use all my frequent flier miles to go?

My company is letting me work from home one day a week, circumstances permitting. Because I supervise 3 staff members, I can’t always leave for a full day, depending on their needs. Sometimes they need my counsel in person when they are working on new an unfamiliar things.

Today is one of the days I can stay home. I can’t tell you how much of a relief it is not to drive into NYC, even just one day a week. It is a 65 mile round trip and just having one day where I don’t have to do it makes the entire week better. I have more energy overall and am not a total basket case by Friday 5 pm.

I will be working on some writing today. I have two final reports, one to write and one to edit. The only challange is that my kitty Pixel lays himself down right in front of the monitor, right on top of my papers. I love the quirks of my kitty cats.

I took Friday off and had a very nice three-day weekend. Slept late each day, puttered around, saw friends, relaxed.

This morning, I set the alarm for 5 am with a plan of going swimming. Since the pool opened for the fall semester, I’ve been going maybe once or twice a week. I used to go every day. So I told myself I would go every day this week.

I get to the pool to find that someone has stolen my bathing suit. Bizarre. I can’t imaging taking a stranger’s suit and actually wearing it!?

So needless to say, no swim this morning. I ordered a new suit from Lands’ End and am having it express mailed but even so it won’t get here til Wednesday at the earliest. That means at best I can swim Thursday and Friday. I ordered an ugly suit so no one will want it. I guess my black tank was just too tempting (but I still do not understand why anyone would wear a stranger’s swimsuit!).

I’m doing my best to not let this color my day. And I think I am succeeding (except for one thing, I didn’t shower this morning because I was planning on showering after my swim. I hate feeling not clean.)

I will take a nice brisk walk during my lunch hour and get some exercise that way. It will be a high of 64 degrees, ideal for a walk. And the leaves are just starting to turn in NYC. They are alread turning upstate where I live.

I leave for St Louis this afternoon. I have a 3-day meeting there Thursday through Saturday.

Since I moved to my new home almost 2 years ago (has it actually been that long??), I almost always fly out of Newark airport — that being the closest one to me. I am seriously racking up the miles on Continental airlines and have just about earned a domestic round trip.

It is a beautifully warm day today and the weather looks good — I hope it is good in the midwest too because I do not want a repeat of my flight to Chicago two weeks ago that took TEN hours!

I’m feeling good today - calm and centered - managed to get myself up at 5:30 am to swim yesterday and I’m sure that helped- I’ve been having a little trouble dragging myself out of bed in the wee hours for my exercies. I will pack workout wear for my trip and try my best to use it in St Louis.

I had an exhausting business trip to Chicago this past weekend, I’m actually taking today (Monday) off from work to recover.

It wouldn’t have been so bad if there wasn’t a monster storm hovering over the entire midwest. The tornado warnings were an added attraction.

It took me 10 1/2 hours to get from Manhattan to the Chicago O’Hare Hilton. It normally takes 5 hours or less. Don’t you just love it when they pack you on the flight and then go sit on the tarmac for hours? Especially now that you can’t take any water on board with you. So I was cranky, claustrophobic, AND dehydrated. PMSy and stressed.

The meeting itself was no fun either–they had alloted one day to do a two days worth of work. And the room was small and the acoustics were terrible, and people kept talking over each other. Very disrespectful.

I came home and binged on carbs — losing my abstinence. Sigh. I’ll get back on track today.

Sorry I’m sounding so negative, but that’s where I am right now. It’s been a while since I’ve been down in the dumps like this. I know I’ll snap out of it eventually.

The pool opened for the fall semester on Monday, and I’ve gone three times already. I hadn’t been swimming since late July, and it was amazing how quickly I fell back into the routine. Although, I must say, I’m only doing about 20 minutes a day for now. I’ll work up to longer sessions gradually.

I am particularly glad the pool is open again because there are some disturbingly gushy and lumpy bits of me that have emerged since the weight has come off. The good news is that I am now within 7 pounds of normal weight for my height and a normal BMI. This is something I scarcely believed possible at one point. But I do need to tone the parts of me that are still there. I always put on weight in my upper arms and that area is looking a bit saggy. Swimming should help.

I want to feel comfortable in my own body. I get massages every other week, and that is a big help. Also, I’ll be doing an 8-week adult ed yoga program starting in October. With that and the swimming, I’m hoping to come to a place where I feel like I am fully inhabiting my body and not trying to distance myself with fat.

Did I mention that I’ve lost 51 pounds? There is a theory going around that my ex-best friend (see last entry) was bugging out because I was changing and she wasn’t. She is about 40 of so pounds overweight.

I’ve found this sort of think in the past too. I remember when I got together with my ex-husband, some people got really weird, even though it was a very happy thing for me. I guess the bottom line is that when you change, your relationships change–and not always for the better. But it is impossible to predict who is going to react how.

Things are going well for me today. I had a sad Septmeber 11 (I fell apart when I saw NYFD guys in Riverside Park that day and one was palying the bagpipes) but am moving on now.

I’m concentrating on healthy living and health relationships.

So yesterday I call up who I thought was my best friend — we’ve known each other for 28 years — because I haven’t heard from her for a while and she tells me she “needs to take a break from this”

This - meaning our friendship.

I am so hurt and sad and confused. I’m trying hard not to turn it against myself. You know, that did I do wrong? What is so bad about me that she “has nothing to say to me” anymore.

The scary thing is I really don’t have other friends in my new location. Thank God I have sisters in the county, and one only 3 miles away. There is nothing like family in a time of crisis. Mollie came right over and I cried on her shoulder.

I know I need to work on developing new friendships, I’ve known it for a while, but now it looks like I’ll really have to push myself to take risks and be vulnerable. So I’m already trying to see the positives here. But it really rots.

The timing was really lousy too. My mom died two years ago and I was just processing my anniversary-related feelings around that loss and then wham! This new one.

I am so sad.