Well said Maverick. To that i will add, Blow back or blow by as I have always called it, is pretty common in all engines with age. I have run an engine with blow by for years and it still worked strong, and ran well. But it didn't smoke. The factory gages to fail. For very little you can put a mechanical gage on yours. I do recommend also getting an up grade if if it does not come with the copper tube. I have seen too many of the plastic ones fail, and then you have a whopper of an oil leak.
I think your PCV valve(positive crankcase ventilation) is in your valve cover. Also make sure with a simple check of the top of the head, that your oil return holes are not clogged. Check the PCV and make sure it is functioning properly.
After doing all of this, you can help the symptoms with an oil additive like Restore, which claims to fill in voids on cylinder walls, to lesson blow by. More oil changes will help too, to lesson the blow by to keep the viscosity break down to a minimum.
Maybe not a good question, but did you do any re-routing of vacuum hoses recently?
Bottom line, still sounds as if you have two issues. Gage malfunction, and an aging engine.