Howdy! If you’re new around here, welcome to Traipsing About, my newsletter about reclaiming creativity and ditching tired personal paradigms. No ChattyChat bots here—I claim hand-spun credit for all drawings, bad jokes, and typos. Only one way to avoid July’s scorching heat. Here in Oregon, I’m still glowing from a birthday week at the coast and in Portland. Friends, nature time, and a plenty of piano! As part of my goal to play more in public, I jumped at the opportunity to thwack away at an old grand piano at a friend’s 50th anniversary party on the trip, plus at a couple locations later ..read more

I originally wrote this post for the piano blog No Dead Guys, which I highly recommend if you’re into music by living composers. My piano teacher, a young Brazilian dude, loves Tupac and Dr. Dre, but plays zero music by living composers. He’s a font of information about work from Bach to Prokofiev, but shudders at the name Ludovico Einaudi. Poor Ludovico. The much-maligned Italian composer is a) hugely popular with listeners and b) disregarded (or straight-up detested) by many musicians. He seems to fall in the same category as Yiruma of The River Flows in You: What is this syrupy, simple n ..read more

Howdy! If you’re new around here, welcome to Traipsing About, my newsletter about reclaiming creativity and ditching tired personal paradigms. No ChattyGPT bots around here—this newsletter is typed by human fingers. This week’s flashback: If this were 750 BC during the Olmec civilization in Mesoamerica, I’d write this newsletter in a script that is still undecipherable in modern times. Which obviously would make it tough to forward to friends in other countries (or epochs). BUT since it’s hard to forward a clay tablet overland and definitely tough through time, it’s probably good this is an em ..read more

Howdy! If you’re new around here, welcome to Traipsing About, my newsletter about reclaiming creativity and ditching tired personal paradigms. No ChattyGPT bots around here—this newsletter is typed by human fingers. Also, that new newsletter header image above is drawn by yours truly—any thoughts on it? I’m loving the early summer vibes in Oregon. Camping trips with friends, including biking plus adventure bocce ball (aka hucking them around in the woods). Back home, our garden is cranking out tasty arugula and the quail flutter about our backyard. Life is good. Is this bocce court regula ..read more

Howdy! If you’re new around here, welcome to Traipsing About, my newsletter about reclaiming creativity and ditching tired personal paradigms. No AI bots around here—I’m your all-too-human guide, Dakota. This week’s flashback: If this were 12th century Europe, I’d translate and transcribe this newsletter into couplets for troubadours to recount in court. From Barcelona to Marseilles to Milan, they’d sing Traipsing About for all ye lords and ladies, hopefully ending with a bawdy joke and a T. Rex mime act. Instead, we’re sticking with boring old email today. At least it’s in English! I’m soak ..read more

Howdy! If you’re new around here, welcome to Traipsing About, my newsletter about reclaiming creativity and ditching tired personal paradigms. Did someone say SPRING?! Mmm, not quite…last night it hit 17 degrees here and snowed six inches. T. Rex is loving it though. This week’s flashback: If this were between 1837-1920, the heyday of the telegraph, I’d hire an operator to convert this newsletter to Morse code. They’d clack away, remove all my bad jokes (not the T. Rexes, nooo), and send it off. Anywhere from a few seconds to days later, it would arrive. Hope you have a Morse code operator ..read more

Howdy! Welcome back to Traipsing About, my newsletter about reclaiming creativity and ditching tired personal paradigms. I hope you had a lovely holiday season. Mr. T. Rex sure did, misplaced star or not. Now he’s busy making T. Rex snow angels. This week’s flashback: If this was 1500 in Japan during the Sengoku epoch, I’d hire a lithe ninja to deliver this newsletter. He’d run up a wall and front flip over a hedge, tacking this issue of Traipsing About to your door with a throwing star. Instead, ShurikenEmail™, here’s the newsletter, no ninjas needed. Probably for the best—painting doors su ..read more

Howdy! Welcome back to Traipsing About, my newsletter about reclaiming creativity and ditching tired personal paradigms. This week’s flashback: If this was 1915 and I was on Shackleton’s Antarctic Expedition, I’d write this newsletter while marooned in sea ice…but you wouldn’t read it for another two years until the marvelous escapade unfolded. Instead, I’m listening to jazz piano and typing this while the snow falls—and I didn’t have to eat seal blubber for breakfast for two years. Fewer stories of adventure though…tradeoffs. This week on Sarging About, Edition #129: Travel, happiness, and ..read more

A village in the Italian Dolomites we stayed in on bike tour. I remember thinking, “I could spend a summer here.” As I’ve written about, in fall of 2020 I learned that I was eligible to seek recognition as an Italian citizen. For 3+ years, I navigated the bureaucratic process to make it happen. In October of 2023, I finally got the official stamp of approval from Italy. It’s still wild to think that I’m a full-fledged Italian citizen! During that process, many people shared their hard-earned lessons with me. Their help was huge, both for the nuts and bolts information as well as simply the r ..read more

Howdy Traipser! If you’re new around here, I’m Dakota and this is my newsletter about reclaiming creativity and ditching tired personal paradigms…and soon, I’ll add travel reports from #trailerlife. If this were the early 1900s and I were emigrating from Italy, I'd get on a crowded boat with this newsletter in hand, traverse the Atlantic Ocean for weeks (yegads, the seasickness), and hand it to you. Instead, click, zap, send, done! Here in Bend, our fabulous fall weather just got smacked down hard, with temps dropping into the 20s and snow on the bike trails. In other words, time to stop screw ..read more