(This was a post on my previous blog, Loner's Highway, where I presented narcissists as another type of loner. Because they're such problematic people, especially for shy people, I'm including them here.) According to The Everything Guide to Narcissistic Personality Disorder, by Cynthia Lechan Goodman, MEd, and Barbara Leff, LCSW, someone may have narcissistic personality … Continue reading Watch out for Narcissists and Sociopaths
Paranormal World
Sigmund Freud once said that if he could live his life again, he would devote it to research into paranormal phenomena. His one time professional associate, later professional enemy, Carl Jung, said near the end of his life that he thought the biggest scientific event of the 21st century would be the beginning of serious … Continue reading Paranormal World
The Dairy Farm |A Galactic bailout for Earth?
This little story was written in 1993, but given the financial fiasco that civilization got itself into in 2008, and hasn't really got out of, with the giant problems of global warming, habitat destruction, over-population, and the need for some kind of global government still staring us in the face as we continue to quarrel … Continue reading The Dairy Farm |A Galactic bailout for Earth?
Watch out for Sociopaths
This was originally a post on my previous blog, Loner's Highway, where I was describing the different types of loner. Sociopaths (sometimes called psychopaths, an older term) are a very different kind of loner. Contrary to what most people think, they are not demented haters of humanity. They like the rest of us very much. … Continue reading Watch out for Sociopaths
In Defence of Bullfighting | The Old Matador
Because I eventually want to put a collection of my SF short stories on this site, I'm introducing another one today. During the winter and spring of 1969 I was in Mexico City, working from Monday to Saturday teaching English in a busy school on the Insurgentes. On Sundays, I regularly visited the famous Plaza … Continue reading In Defence of Bullfighting | The Old Matador
Rescuing Shyness |Fate of the 25% Man
Recently I was reading some pages from my journal written in 2009 when I was 59 years old, and I came upon a forgotten thought: Looking back on the previous decades of my life, reflecting on what I had learned and not learned, achieved and not achieved, I said to myself: "You are 25% social, … Continue reading Rescuing Shyness |Fate of the 25% Man
Science| Animals vs Insects |Insects are Animals
I wish I had a dollar for every time I've heard someone say, or write, that insects aren't animals. When one of my daughters was ten years old, she came home one day with the story that her teacher had told the class that insects weren't animals. She spoke up, declared that insects were animals, … Continue reading Science| Animals vs Insects |Insects are Animals
My Lost Book – Skol
Though I've been told that my novel Skol is the best of my books, you would never guess that from its sales. My other novel, The Birdcatcher, has had many readers over the years, and the first edition of The Shyness Guide was once selling well enough that I was threatening to break even financially. Meanwhile, Skol has had no following at all. … Continue reading My Lost Book – Skol
Why do Young People like my books?
Although the central character in my novel, The Birdcatcher, is 52 years old, that book seems to please young readers more than old ones. One shy teen-age reader told me that she found the book to be "not just the story of one lone man, but of a worldwide type of people who have been so well … Continue reading Why do Young People like my books?
Alan Conrad 