Murphy's Law and Connecting with Mother Earth

Ok.. so we've been a little distracted with having a day or two off, organising some routine maintenance and then Murphy got involved!!

Firstly; day off. Actually I managed to get two nights in the mountains nearby at a wonderful old wooden hut. It was built, not that long ago, by the family who own the farm. They kindly let me use it once in awhile, and it is a great place to escape all the normal hassles that go with running a business. I get to drive our little Suzuki 4 wheel drive over the farm track to within about a half hour walk from the hut. Luxury. This is helpful if you (like me) decide that it might be fun to have a rifle and even a spotlight and battery.. just in case! Along with that, all you need is some food, extra clothes, sleeping bag and maybe a gas cooker. The hut has everything else. Even had some surprise company this time, in the form a rat, that kept me awake a bit as I tried to evict it! Also had a family of our little owls outside each night. I got to watch them from the bath! Two very recently fledged young with Mum and Dad frantically trying to keep up with their feeding demands. Interesting to watch, as they let you get very close, seemingly quite unafraid. Always amazing to have a bird fly within arms length of you and not be able to hear it moving the air around, it seems quite impossible. I did manage to stalk up to within probably 15 meters of a nice sized wild pig, and thats when Murphy got involved (the first time!) and I clean missed it! darn! still, I'm guessing the pig was quite pleased :)

So then the other event was a fluctuating oil pressure while getting ready to fly in the Pitts. This is VERY disconcerting, as although there are lots of instruments in a little plane, there are really only one or two that I just cannot happily fly without, and of course oil pressure is one of those. Long story (and it really was) short, after expending quite some time and $$$ trying to get to the bottom of the fault, it came down to Mother Earth again!!!! For those of you unfamiliar with electrical systems, (and the oil pressure gauge is electric) it is CRITICAL to have really good electrical earthing. Never have I had an earthing fault manifest in such a manner. WHEW!!! at least we got it, and of course never had a real problem with oil pressure, just a bad indication!!! So quite a week, and thankfully ended with a happy outcome, and the oil pressure is once again doing exactly what it should.. Makes for one happy pilot person!