My village can't be like this

Chapter 133 Buying Coal for the Winter
Zhang An thought for a while, and told Huang Erye what he thought, to see what the old man thought.

Huang Erye thought for a while before telling Zhang An that we should go down the mountain together first.

Although the old man also knew that the old cow was left here, he might encounter other beasts.

But it's not a problem to wait here all the time, the main reason is that I don't know when everyone will find here.

It's better to take a gamble, first go down the mountain to find everyone, and then drag the cows.

If something happened to the cow when he came back, it would be his own fate.

Because I didn't think carefully, now the people in the village are all looking for me in the mountains, which is already causing trouble for everyone.

Hearing what Huang Erye said, Zhang An took Huang Erye down the mountain to find everyone.

After walking through the rotten stone forest and the sandy forest in front, Zhang An followed the same path back to where he came from just now.

Because when he came, he left a mark on the road, so that the people behind could find him.

I was very lucky. I just walked out of the sand forest and saw several swaying rays of light at the foot of the mountain.

This must be someone from the village looking for them. These lights are all flashlights.

When Zhang An saw the flashlights, he opened his mouth and shouted in the direction of the light source.

"I'm Zhang An, I found the second master."

Since Zhang An can see the light, it proves that he is not far away.

Sure enough, after the voice passed, everyone responded immediately.

Two groups of people walk up and down together.

After walking for a while, everyone joined together.

It turned out that everyone looked for it separately, but no one found it in the end.

And everyone is not looking for it blindly. When looking, they will still pay attention to see if there are traces of people walking by.

Most of the mountains are now wolf chicken forests, and it's easy to see if anyone has walked through them.

So some places were obviously where no one had walked, and everyone returned the same way.

They also happened to meet the flashlight that Huang Ming brought from home, and everyone summed up the directions they had just looked for.

Only the side where Zhang An left has no news, so everyone looked for it.

In the end, I also found the imprint left by Zhang An. Just halfway through, the two groups met.

"Second Uncle, you don't care. If the cow is lost, everyone can look for it. If you have an accident, what should you do? Even if the cow is gone, at most you don't have any money. Don't do this next time."

What Huang Erye did this time was indeed a little thoughtless.

But this matter has to be said by the old uncle. As the village head, he is right in everything he says.

Huang Erye knew that he hadn't considered it just now, so he apologized to everyone now.

Everyone came out to help sincerely, and they were all worried that something would happen to Huang Erye, so they were relieved to see that Huang Erye was fine.

In the end, Zhang An told everyone about the situation of the cow, and while everyone was there, he could go up and drag the cow up.

So as usual, Huang Ming went home to report the letter, so that the family members could feel at ease.

The rest of the others went up, dragging cattle to the Rotten Stone Forest.

With the flashlight, the road was no longer blacked out, and everyone quickly passed through the sand forest and arrived at the rotten stone forest.

This stone pit is quite deep. After everyone tried several times just now, they couldn't directly drag the cow up.

There is not much mud here, and no one brings a hoe, otherwise they can fill it with soil and put the cattle on it.

Although it is called Rotten Stone Forest, these stones are not small pieces, but rocks that grow together with the mountains.

There is no way to move it directly, so the idea of ​​backfilling fell through.

It would be much easier if there was a bar, but everyone came in a hurry, and no one brought it.

But when Zhang An saw someone carrying a hatchet, he thought of it as soon as he turned his mind.

"Uncle, we have hatchets, we can chop down a few trees and put them down to build a bridge."

Zhang An did what he said, took the machete from the villagers, ran to the edge of the sand forest, and picked a few sand trees with the mouth of a bowl to chop.

Seeing this, the man with the hatchet followed Zhang An in cutting down trees.

Finally, after cutting seven or eight trees of this size, cut off the branches and put them directly into the stone pit.

The old cow probably knows that everyone is saving it at this moment, so when it sees the sand tree that everyone put down, it will stretch its feet to make room for it.

In the end, stepping on the bridge made of sand trees bit by bit, although I slipped down many times during this period.

But in the end, the old scalper was dragged out, and the result was good.

The main reason is that it is far away from the village, and it took an hour or two to go back and forth to get things, so Zhang An didn't suggest going back to get the bars.

When everyone dragged the old scalper out, Zhang An checked the time, and it was already past nine o'clock.

The people here basically haven't eaten yet, and they started to come into the mountain before it got dark in the afternoon.

But now he found Mr. Huang and dragged the cow out of the pit.

Everyone was very happy, so they temporarily forgot about eating.

By the time everyone returned to the village, it was already ten o'clock in the evening.

Normally, everyone would have fallen asleep at this time.

After Huang Ming came back to report his safety, the family members knew that the old man was found and the cow was fine.

The people in the family were no longer in a hurry, thinking that everyone hadn't eaten now, and they all went out to help hungry.

So Second Grandma Huang called her daughters-in-law over, and hurriedly prepared the meal at home.

It's so late, everyone will have a hot meal when they come back from the mountain.

When Zhang An and the others arrived, the meal at Second Grandma Huang's house had already been prepared.

Everyone was not polite, as soon as Second Grandma Huang shouted, everyone went over to sit and eat together, and sat at two tables.

During the meal, Huang Erye apologized to everyone again and thanked everyone.

In any case, the results are good now.

Everyone also smiled and said it's nothing, just don't be so scary next time.

Especially Huang Erye's family, but they were terribly frightened.

After everyone finished eating, they all went back to their homes.

Next, the Huang Erye family "had a meeting" by themselves.

Early the next morning, Zhang An woke up with a gust of morning wind and shivered.

It is obvious that today is much colder than usual.

Looking outside, there is frost everywhere, no wonder it has become so cold.

Although it is already winter, in Zhang An's eyes, it is winter when there is frost, otherwise the temperature will not drop.

"You baby, why don't you wear an extra dress? It's frosty today and it's very cold."

Wang Fang, who just came from the old house, found that Zhang An was still wearing only a short sleeve in the yard.

Quickly remind him to go back and get dressed, it will be uncomfortable if he catches a cold.

Zhang An didn't hold back, he didn't know when he came out just now, but now he turned and went back to the house to find a coat to put on his body.

"Uncle, where are you going?"

Uncle Zhang Jianwen passed by the door in a carriage, and Zhang Anshun said hello.

"Hey, it's getting cold now, take advantage of the good weather to go and pull a cart of coal back."

In Changqing Village, no firewood is burned in winter, but coal is burned for the winter.

Because there are coal mines in many places nearby, the nearby coal is relatively cheap.

So everyone is used to burning coal all year round and so on.

So before winter, people don't have to go to the mountains to cut firewood.

Zhang An took a look at his own coal pit, and there seemed to be not much left.

There are coal noodles inside, and there are no coal lumps. It seems that it is time to buy some.

You can tell the difference between the two as soon as you hear the name. You can use mud and stone to compare them.

Coal blocks are very resistant to burning, and coal noodles are especially easy to burn out.

Most of the families in Zhang An's village rarely use coal when the weather is not cold.

Throughout the year, most coal noodles are mixed with water and mixed into coal balls for burning.

The briquette is wet, so it will dry out after being placed on the coal stove.

Not only can it seal the burning coals, but the lumps of coal will make it difficult to extinguish the fire in the stove, and persist until the next morning.

And the coal lumps that were pried off the next morning can be broken into small pieces and put in for burning, which can easily be ignited.

So now the children in rural families not only have to mow the grass, feed the pigs, cook and wash the dishes after school, but also have to mix coal at night.

There is also a special saying in the village, which is called "don't worry about going forward, mix coal and wash dishes after rushing".

These words are often said by those children when there are several children in the family.

It means to compare the speed when eating, don’t worry about everything that is eaten in advance, and mix coal and wash dishes when the last one is finished.

But it's different in Zhang An's house, there is no such thing as comparing speed.

In the past, Zhang An hated mixing coal and washing dishes, because he was the only child in their family.

As long as Wang Fang and Zhang Jianguo went to work in the fields, Zhang An would do all the housework by himself.

In order to mix coal, each family in the village has two coal pits.

A very large one and a very small one.

The large coal pit is for storing coal when returning from buying coal.

The small coal pits are used for mixing coal. Generally, the small coal pits are at the door of one's own house, which is also for convenience.

And mixing coal is very simple, shovel the coal surface into a small coal pit, pour some water and yellow mud into it.

Use the hoe at home to stir back and forth in the coal pit, and sometimes you need to use coal sticks to hammer.

As for coal sticks, most people cut down a tree that is as thick as a bowl.

In the next few years, some people directly used hammers.

Therefore, mixing coal in rural areas is also called flushing coal.

When mixing coal, the yellow mud is added mainly to make the mixed coal noodles better into agglomerates.

The other is to save a little bit of coal when burning a fire. After all, it is bought with money, and it is a little bit to save a little.

But you can't add a lot of yellow mud, it's all in proportion, if you add too much, the coal lump won't be able to burn at all, it can't be burned.

Although later generations Zhang An used induction cookers and gas stoves for more than 20 years.

But the housework of mixing coal has always been around Zhang An's entire childhood.

Basically, since he was seven or eight years old, he has mixed the coal at home. I believe this is the case for many people.

When the winter is very cold, you can't just burn coal lumps.

Because coal lumps are easy to burn out, it is not easy to maintain the temperature of the fire.

Especially in the past two years, many people have bought iron stoves.

So when it is very cold, coals have to be burned.

It seems that there are special briquettes sold in the county, but they are all sold to people in the county.

The briquette used to be a round briquette, exactly the size of a household furnace core.

In the past two years, briquettes have begun to appear, and they cost about [-] to [-] cents each.

Only a few people in Hongyan Town buy briquettes for use, let alone in these rural areas.

Now there is no one in the town who specializes in selling coal, mainly because they don't make much money, and coal is too cheap now.

And there is a place in the county that specializes in selling coal, called the coal management station.

If the village wants to buy coal, whether it is coal noodles or coal lumps, it has to go to the coal pipe station in the town to buy it.

In fact, you can also send it home, but it is the same as buying bricks, you have to buy enough.

So in many cases, people who go to buy coal find several families to work with.

If you buy enough in this way, they will bring it to you in a car, and then the family will divide it among themselves.

Otherwise, you can only find a car to pull it yourself, or you can pay for the freight yourself.

Zhang An was thinking about buying coal when suddenly a hare fell in front of Zhang An.

Looking up, she found Huatou standing on the fence on the third floor and looking at herself.

This guy is planning to throw the rabbit to death.

Since Huatou has become familiar with Zhang An's house, he runs out to grab something and comes back from time to time, so he can be regarded as Gu's family.

Usually, Zhang An doesn't need to feed it, it can find food outside by itself.

In the beginning, it caught a chick in the village.

When someone came to the door, this guy thought it was the same as before.

Zhang An had no choice but to apologize to others, and finally lost the chicken money.

Then Huatou was severely punished by Zhang An, and since then it has not dared to mess around in the village.

Zhang An waved his hand to indicate that he had received it, and Huatou flew back to the nest by himself.

Zhang An's family also has a lot of rabbits now, there must be more than ten or twenty.

It was bred by the pair of rabbits that Zhang An brought out before, and the couple's reproductive ability was too strong.

In the past six months, several litters have been born, and the first and second litters have grown into big rabbits.

When Zhang An went to feed these two days, he found that three or four female rabbits had also started raising cubs.

Animals like rabbits, as long as they grow up and start to give birth to the first litter, they will continue to give birth.

At this rate, by next year, the number of rabbits in Zhang An's family will more than double.

It seems that they have to find a way to deal with them. If this continues, the rabbit pen may not be able to hold them in a long time.

Zhang An's family would usually kill themselves to eat, and when guests came, some would order Wang Fang's signature spicy rabbit meat.

Even so, it can't stop the speed of the rabbit's reproduction at home.

What's more, the weather is cold during this time, and there are even fewer people coming now.

It used to be that there would be a group of people coming in two or three days, but now it is no longer possible. There are only a few people in a week, probably because of the cold weather.

And not everyone who comes will want to eat rabbit.

On the contrary, Zhang An's home-grown chicken and goose are selling well, and every time people come, they will eat these two.

Zhang An brought the prey brought back by Huatou home.

"Mom, here, this is what Huatou brought back today."

"I'll boil water, and your dad will scald it later."

Wang Fang looked at it, and found that this rabbit was not very big, and he could make a pot of it later for his own food.

"Then I'll go to the homes of the second and fourth grandpas."

"What are you going for?"

"Isn't it cold? I finished my meal and wanted to buy some coal. I'll go and see if the old people still have coal to burn."

Hearing what Zhang An said, Wang Fang didn't say anything.

The couple cared about the three old people because the old people left early.

Now Zhang An's second grandpa and second grandma's house is much better than before.

In the past, the sons in the family didn't care much about them. Anyway, when the whole family met, they would quarrel.

In the final analysis, it is all caused by poverty.

Now the eldest son, Zhang Jianzhong, has made some money, and the situation is also big.

Usually, I would take some of what I ate at home, and during the holidays, I would come over and ask the two of them to spend it together.

(End of this chapter)