I've got three—count 'em, one, two, three—projects going right now. I'm wrapping up an article, "Roper v. Simmons and the Limits of the Adjudicatory Process," on the recent Supreme Court decision banning the death penalty against juvenile offenders. I've got a bit more refining to do on another article, "Misplaced Angst: Another Look at Consent-search Jurisprudence," where I explore the philosophical underpinnings of consent in Fourth Amendment analysis. The third piece I've tentatively titled (and I mean tentatively, since I'm at the very beginning stages of it), "Of Sex and Enemy Combatants: An Essay on the Faces of Dignity in Lawrence v. Texas and the Enemy-combatant Cases." Call me nuts, but I'm trying to thematically tie together the Supreme Court's decision protecting same-sex sodomy and the developing jurisprudence involving so-called "enemy combatants" in our so-called war on terror. I think these disparate areas of constitutional law, when treated together, tell us something important about the role of dignity in promoting the public sphere in society.

My article, "Mitigation and the Capital Defendant Who Wants to Die: A Study in the Rhetoric of Autonomy and the Hidden Discourse of Collective Responsibility," has been accepted for publication with the Hastings Law Journal. It will come out in late spring, I'm told. I've also got a handful of short essays being published in the upcoming Encyclopedia of American Civil Liberties. I wish I could say that my manuscript of a novel—yeah, I wrote a novel—was being published, but teaching and scholastic writing have kept me so busy that I haven't had time to get the manuscript out to prospective agents. The novel is called Smack, as in the stuff that'll get you addicted and emaciated.

Wow, that's a tough question. Two hurled me into very unfamiliar worlds, which is probably why I regard them as the most interesting.

The first one involved a pastor with the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America who was accused of seducing a nun, which he admitted doing. The church wanted my client defrocked for that sexual indiscretion. Now, I've litigated in a lot of venues, but defending a client in a church tribunal was pretty far out for me. The "jury" consisted of 12 church leaders from across the country, all highly steeped in biblical teachings. I'm pretty irreligious, but I know a bit about Jesus' teachings (much I learned by reading Tolstoy), and I used what I knew to set up my major defense theme—by what measure ye measure, so shall ye be measured. The "jury" voted to return the pastor to his congregation—a very gratifying win—only to have that verdict overturned by some church officials at the church's headquarters. That pretty much told me the trial was a sham, conducted only because the church officials never believed that the jury would do anything but defrock my client.

The second case was another mind trip, but in a very different way. My client, Michael Alig, was one-time "King of the Club Kids" in New York City. "Club Kids" were a real phenomenon in Manhattan's hip nightlife back in the mid-'90s. I really can't describe it in any way to do it justice, but you can see a cinematic depiction of the Club Kids in a movie that was made about my case, "Party Monster" with Macaulay Culkin playing my client. They'd sweep into the club with a flourish, arms outstretched, heads held high with eyeliner and painted lips and sequined chiffons, peignoirs, furs, six-inch spikes and wildcat spandex, pushing their joi de vivre into the room, floating along with a life force fueled by their own self-proclaimed fabulousness, doing unbelievable things while straight America slept to restore themselves for another day at the office. Anyway, Michael became hooked on a variety of designer drugs, and while in a drug-induced haze, killed his roommate, poured Drano down his throat, hacked up the body into little pieces in his bathtub, put the body parts in a box, dragged it into the elevator and put it into the trunk of a yellow cab ("man, just take me to the East River, fast"), and dumped it in the water. A few weeks later, the box washed ashore in Staten Island and Alig was arrested. While facing state murder charges, the feds got into the action, busting him for drug trafficking. No trial for Alig, though. Plea bargaining all the way. And he got a good deal—concurrent time for the state and federal offenses: 10 to 20 years. The federal sentencing hearing, where I called as witnesses several one-time Club Kids, was worth the price of a subway token to the federal courthouse in Brooklyn.

Fiction: tough call, but I'd have to say re-reading Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian affected me the most. I decided to read it again to help me come to terms with my tangled feelings about the Iraq debacle. This is the best book that I know of about the roots of American violence. Next to Faulkner, McCarthy is my favorite.

Non-fiction: a surprisingly good biography of Jim Morrison, that enigmatic Dionysian figure of the 1960s who I consider the hip-equivalent to Nietschze. The book is Jim Morrison: Life, Death, Legend, by Stephen Davis. Okay, it's not the "best" nonfiction I've read this year, but it is an apt counterpoint to McCarthy's book, which is why this one leaps to mind. Whereas Blood Meridian illuminates how deeply violent we are as a people, how violence has seeped into our souls and our beingness, this recounting of the life and times of an American poet and rock star shines a light on a very different facet of American culture—a country of incredible energy and verve, a place where it may indeed be better to burn out than to fade away.

Hmmm. It all depends, doesn't it? I like to get up before sunrise and write. Sets a good tone for the day. If there's a mountain nearby with lots of snow on it, then move out of my way, unless you want my skis to bop you in the head and my poles to poke out your eyes. A good blues band over at the local club? Well, you pay the cover and I'll cover the drinks. Nothing like swimming on a blazing hot day or hiking on a narrow dusty trail with an autumn nip in the air and birds chirping like there's no tomorrow. Yeah, if only we could do more of that, live like there's no tomorrow.

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