I was addicted to amphetamines at the time I got busted, but I tend to think I was on a determined, self-destruct course that had little to do with the effect of Benzedrine.

I had a naïve idea that if I could tell the story, people would be outraged and do something about conditions in the jails.

Although I was simply what today would be called a "mule" - the bottom of the food chain in the drug biz - the federal system treated me from beginning to end like a major criminal, and I still don't know why, other than that in those days, 6.5 ounces of heroin was a big load. Ludicrous by today's standards, when coke, heroin, and weed are shipped across the border by the ton.

At eighty-one, health club-lusting is as close as I'll ever come to getting laid again.

My friends in prison were mostly women more like myself: not historical figures who I did not relate to as peers, but hookers and addicts.

I can say now is that sneaking up on people is a major delight in my old age, but it always has been. A desire, even a need, to shock.

People think I'm educated because I talk and write well, but the fact is I never finished high school. I've read a lot, is all.