I traveled around the world on a seven-month solo backpacking trip in 1992-93, writing several letters back home that I hope to post here someday. This page does offer the five letters I sent back from my lengthy trip to Africa with Beth Fischi, as well as two dozen short notes called "Greetings From Seattle" (1995). But first, an amazing episode that happened right here in my home town of Austin, Texas....

Lord British's 1988 Spook House

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One of the most fabulous experiences I've ever had.

African Dispatches: I visited Africa so you wouldn't have to. Letters from my seven-month 1998-99 trip:

• Kenya: Pushing the Envelope, but not Hard (July 1998)
• Tanzania and Zanzibar: Standing on Zanzibar (August 1998)
• Malawi: ...But We Wouldn't Want to Live Here (October 1998)
• Zimbabwe and Namibia: Back in the Bubble Again (November 1998)
• South Africa: Postscript (March 1999)

Greetings From Seattle: Written to Austin friends during a ten-month business pilgrimage to the Wizards of the Coast game company in Seattle (1995).

• January-February: Moving in; absolutely not infatuated with editor; anti-tax crank; ugly Sound of Music incident; uglier wetlands; John McPhee reading
• March-May: Afterlife vision in a cherry tree; Robie House; high-efficiency kite flying; bonsai growers with bad teeth; screwed by a glad-handing weasel; Barbershop Quartet Hell
• June-July: Yen to travel again; going psycho in India; twins; Dorothy Gale is a Las Vegas ho
• August-September: Highland Games; Magic World Championships; woolly worms forecast winter; Woodstock for flies; life lessons; aftermath