My village can't be like this

Chapter 433 Gourd

Every May, the first shift of summer arrives. At this time, many places begin to feel the fiery enthusiasm of summer.

Moreover, this period is also the busiest time for everyone, but no matter how busy we are, everyone is very happy.

Although the book only talks about the golden autumn in October, May is actually the first harvest season of every year.

Here in Hongyan Town, the most important cash crops for farmers are rapeseed, rice and corn. Wheat is also grown, but it is relatively rare and cannot be ranked high.

For ordinary families, rapeseed is their main source of income, and even rice and corn in the second half of the season cannot compare.

The first is the planting area. When rapeseed is planted in winter every year, most households will plant rapeseed in paddy fields or mountainous areas.

But it is different in summer and autumn. Rice can only be planted in paddy fields, and the remaining mountainous areas are responsible for growing corn.

Hongyan Town is a place with relatively good geographical conditions in the mountainous area, and every household has a paddy field.

Today's era is different from that of later generations. No one would be willing to use paddy fields to grow other crops. Rice fields are rice fields.

Therefore, even if there is a bumper harvest of rice and corn, the harvest will not be as large as rapeseed, and naturally it will not be sold for that much money.

Moreover, rice is the food that everyone needs every day. Even if there is a good harvest, it is impossible to sell all of it.

The same is true for corn. Everyone raises a few animals at home, and if the animals are sold out, they will not be able to keep them anymore.

Rapeseed is different. Not many people eat vegetable oil now. Daily cooking oil is basically pork suet harvested on the streets.

Because everyone now does more physical labor and it happens more frequently, lard is much more resistant to hunger than Narushizi vegetable oil.

Therefore, rapeseed oil is not considered an oil for daily use. Even if some people press the oil, they cannot extract much, and the rest are sold.

Therefore, rapeseed is the main source of income for ordinary farmers.

Zhang An still remembers that when he was in school, Wang Fang and Zhang Jianguo had to sell a lot of rapeseed every year to pay for his tuition.

Therefore, no matter how busy and tired we are in May, everyone is very happy, because what is shed is the sweat of harvest.

This is true for ordinary people, and it is even more true for Zhang An's family.

Throughout May, aside from the rapeseeds in the several acres of fields, cherries, strawberries and peaches matured one after another. This is the main source of income for Zhang An's family.

Of course, this is also a great gain for the villagers.

Because this month they received several months' worth of wages from Zhang An's house, and they also had work to do every day.

When Zhang An's family was sending away the ripe peaches, busy May was also waving goodbye to everyone.

"Xiao An, remember to go to town and buy some realgar tomorrow morning."

During dinner in the evening, Wang Fang explained the matter to Zhang An solemnly.

Even though there are only two days left in this month, tomorrow happens to be the fifth day of the fifth lunar month, the Dragon Boat Festival.

After the paddy fields were plowed, everyone was not in a hurry to move the rice seedlings. Instead, they took advantage of the glory of the Dragon Boat Festival and had a rare free time to rest.

The family happily makes rice dumplings, hangs mugwort and sprinkles realgar wine around the house.

For people in the mountains, you don’t have to eat the rice dumplings and hang the mugwort, but you must sprinkle the realgar wine.

If someone's family doesn't sprinkle realgar wine, it means that their family is not an authentic mountain family.

After all, as the saying goes, sir, you don’t want a snake crawling under your bed when you sleep at night.

This is true. When Huang Ming's father, Huang Dabiao, was young and not yet married, a snake crawled under his bed.

Huang Dabiao was very frightened that time, because it was not Bai Suzhen who got under his bed, but a snake as big as an adult's arm.

According to villagers, Huang Dabiao was really bitten by a snake on his thigh that night, but luckily it was a non-venomous cauliflower snake and he escaped.

But even a cauliflower snake is very dangerous, because it bites at the base of the thigh, and if it goes higher up, it may be incapacitated even if it is not poisoned to death.

Therefore, Huang Dabiao, who has experienced that time, is very active in sprinkling realgar wine every year.

If it were Bai Suzhen, he might still be enjoying it, but unfortunately not, he didn't want to continue to encounter those cold and cold guys.

The same goes for Wang Fang, because she is really afraid of snakes, so she pays great attention to them every year.

She had not forgotten that last year when the goshawk at home was hatching its eggs, a snake unknowingly climbed onto the roof of her house.

"Okay mom, I'll buy it when I get up tomorrow morning."

Zhang An remembered that he had not remembered the town for a long time, and it was time to go out for a walk and get some fresh air.

It just so happens that I can go to the street tomorrow and tell Butcher Zheng that the big black dog has given birth to puppies.

In the middle of the night, when everyone was quiet, Zhang An came to the space.

Because the gourds he planted have grown, speaking of these gourds, he spent some energy to keep an eye on them every day.

Looking at the gourds on the gourd vine that had become much darker in color, Zhang An reached out and tried to see if he could pick them off.

But this time, to Zhang An's surprise, he just held the gourd's bottom, turned it slightly twice, and then the gourd was picked off.

It's not the same as last time. It can't be picked off alive or dead. It seems that the gourd has really grown now.

The gourd now is much lighter than when it was first grown, and it doesn't feel as heavy when you pick it up.

After throwing it in his hand, Zhang An went to the small courtyard to find a saw and cut off the mouth of the gourd.

When the gourd seeds inside were poked out, the gourd seeds turned out to be the same purple color as the gourd.

And you can see from the mouth of the gourd that the inner wall of the gourd has the same color as the outer surface.

It seems that this gourd is different from ordinary gourds. The color on its body goes straight to the inside.

Zhang An thinks this is pretty good, and it saves him the trouble of painting the gourd.

The more I looked at it, the more satisfied I became. This purple gourd looked very majestic and had a shadow of Taishang Laojun's purple gold gourd.

After hollowing out the inside, Zhang An polished the inside again with the prepared wire brush.

After observing deeply, he found that the polishing was not very clean, so he started again and gave the purple gourd another comfortable internal massage.

After finishing this one, Zhang An felt that it was not enough, so he immediately went to pick some red, orange, yellow, green, blue and black ones from the gourd vine.

There were green gourds growing on the gourd vine, but he had no idea of ​​picking them because he didn't like them.

I believe that no male compatriot will like this color, of course, except for those with special hobbies.

Such noble green should be reserved for those who are destined.

After cleaning several gourds, Zhang An found half a piece of wood with good texture and started carving the gourd plugs.

Others use fine precious wood or jade as the main material.

Zhang An didn't have it here, and he didn't have that pursuit, so he could do it with a simple piece of wood.

These gourds are what he plans to use to make wine gourds, so they must be washed inside.

So before leaving the space, Zhang An filled several gourds with spring water and stuffed the gourds with stoppers.

It will be easier to clean it after it has been soaked for a period of time.

Some people make wine gourds, and the inside must be waterproofed with lacquer or beeswax.

However, Zhang An only wanted to use it to hold wine or water, and use it as a kettle when going out. We don’t want to store it for a long time, so this process can be completely omitted.

Moreover, those processes also test skills, and people who don't know how to do it can easily damage the gourd.

Zhang An has a lazy temper, so he must do as little trouble as possible so that he won't cause trouble for himself.

But when it was time to fill the gourd with water, Zhang An discovered a very outrageous phenomenon.

This broken gourd doesn't look big, but it seems to be quite large inside.

Zhang An brought a bucket full of water and filled them with water. After only filling two gourds, the bucket bottomed out. The people in Zhang An were dumbfounded.

You must know that this gourd is one foot long, and there are so many bowls for serving vegetables at home. It doesn't look like it can hold so much water.

Zhang An didn't believe in evil, so he opened the stopper and poured the water from the gourd into the bucket.

When the two gourds of water were emptied, the liquid level in the bucket returned to the same level as before.

"Is the color of this gourd just an appearance, and the real magic lies in the capacity inside this gourd?"

After pretending twice, Zhang An fell into deep thought.

Although these gourds grow in space, according to past practices, there must be something unusual.

Although the phenomenon was strange when it grew out before, after observing it many times, Zhang An gave up the mysterious and unrealistic ideas in his mind.

I just thought that the overall color of this gourd was what made it different from ordinary gourds.

Unexpectedly, this ultimate move was still being suppressed. If he hadn't poured water into it, he wouldn't have discovered it.

But after all, this was a product of space. Zhang An didn't think much about it, but took it for granted.

If there is nothing strange at all, it would be a shame because it was born in this space.

Looking back, I realize that this gourd is indeed quite capable of holding, but it's actually not that exaggerated.

Because they can only hold half a bucket of water, which is three times the size.

Whether compared with Taishang Laojun's purple gourd or Calabash Baby's small gourd, it's not up to par at all.

The last six gourds were filled with three buckets of spring water. After placing them in the wooden house, Zhang An returned to the room.

"Zhang An, it's time to get up. Mom asked me to buy realgar on the street."

Early the next morning, Zhang An did not get up as early as usual.

Instead, when the sun was shining on his butt, Su Ying came over to urge him to get up.

He hadn't slept in for a long time, but he slept a little too late last night.

Because those gourds were so fun in space last night, so he played with them for a long time without knowing it.

Even when I came out of the space, not much time had passed.

But he lay in bed and couldn't fall asleep for a long time.

Because after seeing those gourds, a bunch of thoughts kept popping up in his head and he was always very clear-headed.

That's how people are, the more they want to fall asleep, the more they can't fall asleep.

He didn't know when he fell asleep later, but he vaguely heard a chicken crow in his ears.

Being dragged off the bed unceremoniously by Su Ying, Zhang An could only get dressed obediently.

Not to mention that Zhang An wasn't angry when he got up. Even if he was, what could he do?

Su Ying is now clearly the eldest son of the family, especially since she has a little ancestor in her belly.

It is simply that when Cao Cao was alive and he was powerful, he still used the emperor to control the princes.

"By the way, why didn't you go to school today?"

Zhang An was a little surprised as to why his wife had time to wake him up today.

"It's Saturday today. I always forget the time. I really don't know what you were thinking about all day long."

Su Ying had no idea about Zhang An's frequent failure to keep track of dates.

Not to mention the day of the week, sometimes he couldn’t answer when asked what day it was.

If I had gone to work, my salary would have been deducted long ago.

"Hey, it's okay. You're the only one in our family who can remember it. I don't have to go to work anyway, so why should I remember it?"

By the time Zhang An got up, it was already past breakfast time at home.

So after washing up, he drove directly to the town.

Although today is Saturday, because it coincides with the Dragon Boat Festival, there is a small market in Hongyan Town.

Moreover, there were many people going to the market in Chang Qing's street. Zhang An met a few older people on the road and took them to the street.

On the road, I met many young children from the village. After seeing Zhang An's car, they shouted respectfully.

Zhang An didn't understand, so he stopped the car on the side of the road. They had seen many battles before, and they wanted to take a ride.

As soon as the young kids saw Zhang An parking his car, they immediately crawled into his car like monkeys.

In the past, Zhang An would have absolutely refused, because at that time he was still immersed in the consciousness of very strict rules and regulations in later generations.

But now after so many years, he has already adapted to the current rules.

Arriving in the town, Zhang An went straight to the stall selling realgar.

But when he found several stalls, he was mostly surrounded by people because there were too many people selling realgar.

No wonder Wang Fang asked him to buy it early, because they had already calculated that there would be a lot of people today.

He had no choice but to arrive late, so he could only wait for the people in front to finish buying.

After waiting for half an hour, Zhang An finally bought the realgar that his mother wanted.

Zhang An had nothing else to buy, so he went to Butcher Zheng's meat stall.

"Hey, Uncle Zheng's business is very good today."

Butcher Zheng sells beef, which is relatively expensive. Even if someone buys it, it won't be too much.

But today, the stall was crowded with people, and business was booming.

It's probably the holidays and everyone wants to eat something good.

After all, other families in the village are the same. Even if they don't buy pork or beef, they will catch a chicken and kill it for the whole family to eat.

That’s why old people often say that children look forward to celebrating the festival, while adults look forward to farming.

"Business is better today, but the Dragon Boat Festival has to be celebrated. Can I give you a piece of it?"

Butcher Zheng was cutting and weighing meat at the same time, and he could still talk to Zhang An. It was like a multi-tasker with a multi-core processor.

(End of this chapter)