Confession...

Forgive me fellow fliers for I have sinned. It had been over 6 months since
I have flown...

I finally got a chance for a short flight yesterday! My first flight
since last September. That flight was to flight breakfasts in northern Iowa
and southern Minnesota. I kept my Ercoupe hangared in Sleepy Eye, MN (Y58)
about 30 miles north of where I live. I started a new job in Fairmont (FRM)
about 30 miles south. This put a big crimp in my flying during the week as
it would be late by the time I drove from Fairmont to Sleepy Eye to just fly
around the patch for a bit. Winter came on and didn't make it any better and
I was usually busy (or crappy weather) on the weekends. A hangar opened up
here in St James (JYG) back in November. I ended up paying hangar rent for
two places for a few months until I finally got it moved out of Sleepy Eye
yesterday.

Yesterday worked out great. My cousin Verlus in Fairmont has a C-150 and
his son Jason from Spencer has a Tri-Pacer. The 3 of us were at the Fairmont
airport yesterday afternoon and I talked them into taking me up to Sleepy
Eye to get my plane moved. We hopped in the Tri-Pacer and headed to Y58. We
pulled my Ercoupe out of the hangar and I did a thorough pre-flight and I
had plenty of fuel to go the 25 (air) miles to JYG. I pulled on the starter
and the engine started, then stopped. Primed some more and it started fine
but ran a bit rough for the first few seconds then ran good. Surprised me
since the plane had been sitting in a Minnesota hangar all winter. Since I'm
not current to carry passengers, I had Jason (a CFI) fly with me in case I
had forgot how to land in the past 6 months. I took off first and Verlus
followed in the Tri-Pacer. He passed us and was already turning off the
runway at JYG when I called 5 miles out. We put my Ercoupe into its new
hangar and headed back to Fairmont.

Even though it was a short flight, it's still flying! The weather was
decent and my landing was about what I usually do so I didn't do too bad for
not flying for over 6 months. Now that my plane is closer to home, I expect
to get more flying in and try to make up for those 6 months. I need a couple
more landings then I'll be current again. I'm planning on going to a chili
feed fly-in at Fort Dodge (FOD) on April 3rd and a fly-in breakfast at
Webster City (EBS) on April 4th.

--
Greg Burkhart