Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. to trick, to plot.

1951

cited in Wentworth & Flexner DAS (1975).

2. to wander along.

1954		D. Pearce Darby Trial 152: The car dipsy-doodled down the hill.
1957		‘Weldon Hill’ Onionhead (1958) 231: ‘The lady cat don’t pleasure up much from that dipsy-doodiddle stuff’.
1983		(con. 1970) S. Wright Meditations in Green (1985) 167: Let the damn planes go where they would. He’d dipsy-doodle on back to his room.
1993		D. Gray Rideau Navigator 101: We dipsy doodled up, down and across at full throttle, and then backed, filled and kept station on a buoy.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 215: Race [...] dipsy-doodled south and north on Crescent Heights.