Chapter 177 Not all money can be made
Jingtou put it aside for the first time. Li Jianguo and Lu Yingming became happy when they saw the steel bars welded together.
"Come on, come on, I haven't dug a well in a long time. Let's see if our skills have improved today." Lu Yingming took off the steel bar from his bicycle, stood it up and walked to the edge of the dug hole.
Li Long put down his bicycle and followed, and saw a small trough dug out in the corner of the pit. The trough was very deep, and water had come out of it, making it look turbid.
Li Jianguo and Lu Yingming held the steel bars and plunged straight into the small pit. One end of the steel bar was sharpened, and it went down more than half a meter.
It started going down very fast, but when we went down five or six meters, we could hear the sound of pebbles hitting the sand and gravel layer further down.
“Now the big work begins.” Li Jianguo and Lu Yingming stopped what they were doing, leaned on the edge of the pit, each rolled a Mohe cigarette, and while smoking, they recalled their past cigarettes. Well experience:
“The water line in our place is considered high. I remember that year when we were drilling a well in the bank, the drill bit went down for more than ten meters before reaching the sand and gravel layer. The sand and gravel layer was enough It is seven or eight meters thick, drilled My head is so blunt..."
"It's different in the city. It's much easier to dig a well in our country," Li Jianguo said, taking a puff of cigarette, "If you find a good place, you can even dig a well. It doesn't take long to get through. Like the public well, it would be a great water outlet..."
"We don't have that ability, and we don't have it in the yard. Let's just dig it here."
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Li Long jumped off the earthen kang, grabbed the steel bar with some curiosity, lifted it up hard, and then pushed it down.
The bottom is very hard. It feels like it hits the stone directly when you press it, making it difficult to penetrate deeply.
“It’s not easy to drill, right?” Lu Yingming said with a smile, “The big drill we used back then was troublesome, and it took a long time to drill a well. Our well is easy to kill, and it can be installed today. Get out of the water!"
Looking at the confident smiles of Li Jianguo and Lu Yingming, Li Long believed it.
Liang Yuemei’s sister-in-law from the Lu family was cooking. Vegetables are being stir-fried on the stove outside, and rice is being steamed on the stove inside. Li Long could smell that a scrambled egg with leeks had been cooked, and a meat dish that should be braised pork - the wild boar meat brought back two days ago came in handy.
After lunch, Li Jianguo and Lu Yingming continued to drill the well, while Li Long rode his bicycle to find materials - he remembered that to kill the well, he needed brick support, cement, sand and gravel to make it stronger.
I remember that in the previous life, Li Jianguo dug a pressure well in the yard more than ten years ago. At that time, he used bricks to cushion the well instead of cement. The bricks were movable and would not take long. It collapsed, so it had to be reinforced frequently, which was quite troublesome.
Li Long rode a bicycle to the county to buy two bags of cement, and then shoveled a bag of coarse sand by the commune river. The best thing to find was bricks. There were a lot of half-cut bricks at Lao Ma because they were produced by the previous team. Li Long unloaded the cement and picked up some.
By the time he had gathered the bricks, Li Jianguo and Lu Yingming had already started to drain the water pipes.
"Has it been laid? Is it in place?" Li Long was a little confused, "So fast? Is there water below?"
"Well, the water layer under the sand and gravel has been hit." Li Jianguo said with a smile, "You haven't seen it. When the steel bars were pulled out, the water spurted out directly. There was so much water down there!"
< br>"How does it taste?" Li Long asked again.
"Sweet! The water is very good!" Lu Yingming said with a smile, "This water is better than the water from the public well over there, and better than the water from the artesian well next to Xiaohaizi!"< br>
"That's great." Li Long was sincerely happy, " Then I will mix cement and sand to build up the well seat later.”
Next, Liang Yuemei and Lu’s wife mixed cement and sand, and Li Jianguo and Lu Yingming filled up the dug hole. Only the pipe that was driven down remained.
After the pit was filled, they began to build a well platform at the pipe, and Li Long dug a ditch from the well to the yard to facilitate the excess water flowing into the vegetable garden.
The well base is well built, the well head is installed, and the next step is to wait.
"It will be ready for use tomorrow morning." Li Jianguo said, "You have to splash water on it tomorrow to prevent the cement from cracking."
"What to do with the remaining cement sand?" Liang Yuemei Looks like there's still some left A pile of mixed cement sand asked, "It can't be wasted."
"It can't be wasted!" Lu Yingming said with a smile, "Don't your family raise pigs? Then just build two pig troughs. ”
"Hitting the pig trough?" Li Long had a vague impression in his mind.
At this time, cement and sand were used to build things. Due to financial constraints, less cement was used and more sand and gravel were used, so it was difficult to say whether the things were strong or not.
Later, when production conditions improved, cement troughs were plastered directly. But at this time, cement was mixed with a large amount of sand and gravel, a hole was dug on the spot, and the trough was plastered in the pit. , and then fill it with soil. There is no need to fill it firmly. After a period of time, the cement, sand and gravel will dry in the shade before digging it out to see the complete situation.
Because less cement is used and there is no steel reinforcement, the pig troughs are prone to rot. Usually one of three pig troughs will rot.
"When wiping, use a few reeds as reinforcements, it should not be easy to rot." Li Long suddenly thought of the crappy project he heard about in his previous life, which was to use bamboo poles instead of steel bars, so building a building would naturally not work. of. But now if you use reeds as tendons to wipe the pig troughs, there will be no problem at all.
"Is it possible?" Lu Yingming was a little confused.
“What’s not good?” Li Long smiled, “Just like you need to use wheat tail (yi) seeds and mud to spread the soil, the role of wheat tail (yi) seeds is in the cement. "The same as Wei Zi."
"Then try it!" Li Jianguo thought. What Li Long said was reasonable, "It doesn't cost anything anyway."
There is nothing to do now, and it will be dark for a while, so a few people divided the work. Li Long went to find the suitable Wei Zi, Li Jianguo and Lu Yingming carried the rough concrete to find a suitable place outside the residential area.
Dry reeds are easy to find, and anyone can pull out two bundles of them - because during the slack season in winter, pulling reeds is a very important source of sideline funds (the specific method will be discussed later).
Li Long found a suitable reed and went south with a shovel. By this time, Li Jianguo and the others had dug out a suitable pit and began to level it.
To create a suitable pig trough, at least the inner surface of the soil must be very flat, so Li Jianguo and the others used a shovel to smooth the surface of the soil.
Li Long measured the pit and began to chop the reeds into corresponding lengths with a shovel. While Li Jianguo and the others were plastering cement and gravel, he put the reeds on top.
After the two pig troughs were plastered, the sun had set and they let them dry for a while. They felt that the cement had begun to solidify, so they slowly added soil to them, trying their best to prevent the soil from causing any damage to the cement surface. influence.
After all this was done, it was already dark. Liang Yuemei cooked soup for the Li family. The two families chatted and laughed and had supper until very late.
Early the next morning, Li Long went over to look at the well seat where the well was being pressed. The cement was already hard to the touch, but not yet dry.
The family didn't dare to use it, so Li Long went to check the situation at the pig trough in the south of the settlement. No one came to touch it, but it must be okay.
It was not until noon that Li Long saw that the cement on the surface had dried, so he tried to put some diversion water in the well head and then pressed it. Soon, pressure came. After a few hard presses, a stream of water flowed out of the mouth of the well. The water was a little turbid at first, but it quickly became clear. The amount of water was really large. After two presses, a large amount of water came out. Li Long pressed the spout of the well and took a sip. It was really sweet and cool. !
Okay, this big project is finally completed.
I think in less than two days, everyone in the residential area will know that the Li family has dug a well, and people nearby will come here to fetch water for food. After all, the water is so clean!
After lunch, Li Long rolled up the small-caliber rifle in a sack and tied it to the beam. He got on his bicycle and rode outside the village. He had to go into the mountains.
Riding all the way to the county seat, Li Long first went to the big yard. Some of the fritillaries in the wing had dried, and Li Long put them away. He came over to see it mainly because he was worried that the dried fritillaries would spoil. After all, there are more caladiums, and they are more rough to dry. If they are really going to break, there is nothing they can do.
Fortunately, the quality of the caladium is good, the temperature and humidity in the house are also okay, and the weather has been good these days, so there are no problems.
When leaving the compound, Li Long took some more bullets with him, maybe he could catch some prey.
Li Long went to Xiaobaiyanggou first. Xie Yundong and the others were very happy to see Li Long arriving. After chatting for a while, Li Long checked the newly made bags in the past two days and found that the quality was good. He was very satisfied.
"Those people never came again." Xie Yundong said, "We have already compiled more than 200 pieces, and we can call it a day in ten days at most."
"That's it. Let everyone work harder. I see that during this period, everyone’s hair and beards have grown longer, and their clothes are extremely dirty. It’s time to go back.”
“Although I work to make money, it’s still weird not to go home for a while,” Xie Yundong said with a smile, “Let me tell you something.” br>
Li Long saw that the sun had set on the top of the mountain, so he pedaled his bicycle towards his wooden house.
No prey was seen along the way, but a few wolf howls were heard in the distant mountains.
Back at the wooden house, Li Long saw that it was not dark yet, so he lit a simple stove outside, grabbed some food, put out the fire after eating, and went back to the house to sleep.
The sun had already risen the next morning. Li Long went out slowly this time to wash up, then make porridge and cook.
After eating, he originally planned to pack up and go to Xiaobaiyanggou. As he was packing, he saw someone walking towards the mouth of the gorge carrying a bag.
Li Long suddenly became alert, turned around and went to the house to get the small caliber.
Seeing Li Long holding the gun, the man also became nervous. He immediately shouted loudly:
"I was introduced by the forestry team and told you that you are harvesting caladiums here...I am digging shellfish." Damn... don’t be nervous, don’t shoot!”
When he heard that the other party was digging for Fritillaria, Li Long was relieved. He shouted in a loud voice:
"Come over here, how much caladium do you want?"
"More than eight kilograms, just dug these two days." The man slowly went to As I walked here, I said, "I am not alone. Others are waiting for me to take the money back..."
"Why don't you go down to the county and sell it to the purchasing station?" Li Long asked. The price he charged was much lower than that of the purchasing station.
“We... came from the mainland and had no household registration. We were afraid of being arrested and assigned to work in the corps. I heard that if we were caught, we would have to work in the desert or be sent back. We I don’t want to go back, I want to make some money first, and then find a job..."
Well, Li Long thinks this rumor is a bit outdated.
After he waited for the man to come over, he said:
"There is no talk of repatriation now. There is a shortage of people everywhere. After entering the Corps, they are actually considered employees, and they will have pensions when they get old. However, Nowadays, in the small-scale peasant economy, people who do small businesses are no longer arrested. The news you heard was probably more than ten years ago.”
"But I don't dare." When the man approached, Li Long found that he couldn't tell his specific age. He said he could be in his twenties, thirties or forties. He had a big beard, messy hair, many patches on his clothes, and his cloth shoes were torn. The mouth, even the pockets are made of cloth.
"Put the fritillary down on the ground and let me take a look. Have you weighed it? How much does it weigh?" Li Long asked.
Although what the other party said was very clear, Li Long still had basic vigilance.
“We weighed it, and it was eight kilograms high.” The man said, “Actually, we still have it, but those few people said... we’d better sell it first before talking about it.”
As he said So he poured the caladium on the wooden floor in front of Li Long's wooden house.
The caladiums are very clean and come in various sizes, but there are no dirty leaves or mud. They must have been picked.
“This Fritillaria is pretty good. You should have asked about my price, right?”
“I have asked. In fact, we asked the forestry team to confiscate it once, and they withdrew. We dug it again in another place." That man is also old. Really, he said, "Three yuan for one kilogram..."
"I'll take three yuan for this caladium." Li Long could see that it had been a while since the caladium was dug out, and it should be every day. They are all dried, so they are semi-dry, and there is nothing rotten or moldy.
Well preserved.
"Here you are twenty-five yuan." Li Long took out the money, counted out two large solidarity notes, and handed over a five-yuan note, "If there are any more later, come and find me sooner or later."
" Okay, okay." The man took the money. Although there were only three pieces, he still counted them carefully. Then he bowed to Li Long with some excitement, turned around and left quickly with the bag.
Li Long looked at the man's back with some emotion.
In the eyes of many mainlanders in this era, there is plenty of food and job opportunities here. However, after coming here, they found that unless there is an opportunity, the most basic thing is to dig food in the fields.
These people don’t want to be farmers, so they will think of various ways. Most still do small business, and some work part-time. Later, there will be many people walking around the streets collecting rags and bottles, or going to work on construction sites with a bag of tools. Later, it was picking cotton, doing long-term work, etc.
Although there are many people who really want to immigrate to the Corps, there are also many who regret it.
Li Long sighed as he packed up the fritillaries, put them in sacks, and put them in the small room, planning to take them away when he left.
Although the forestry team members left, these stragglers gave Li Long a good opportunity to make money.
If you have money, who doesn’t want to make it?
(End of this chapter)