Era: Started from raising livestock in the mountains

After dinner, Lin Heng coaxed his daughter to sleep as usual and read fairy tales to her.

He has enough patience to cultivate children in this life. He thinks that when the children grow up, it depends on their own wishes. He doesn't need to plan these.

If they don't want to learn, it's good to have a happy childhood. Anyway, they have their own safety.

What he wants to cultivate in his children from an early age is the habit of reading. He thinks that the spiritual inner advance is far more important than those external things.

If you see the road clearly, you can reach the destination even if you walk slowly. If you can't see the road clearly, you can only fly around like a headless fly and turn in circles.

Countless great figures have appeared in the long history of mankind, and each of them has indirectly or directly changed the historical process of mankind in some aspects.

And their great thoughts and profound insights are all preserved through books.

Facts have also proved that the difficulties and problems encountered by ordinary people have also been encountered by those great men, and they have left corresponding solutions in their works.

Reading these books can not only solve your own confusion, but also understand the thoughts of these great men and understand how they become great step by step.

Lin Heng had survived the most difficult years in books in his previous life, so he hoped that his children would also have the habit of loving reading.

With a psychological age of 60, he has enough patience to cultivate children's reading habits little by little from an early age and take them to read.

Xiaoxia was very lively tonight. Lin Heng read her fairy tales for more than 40 minutes before she fell asleep.

When Lin Heng went to bed, he found that his wife had fallen asleep. He looked at her messy face and smiled.

He blew out the candles and lay down to sleep.

It was a peaceful night. At five o'clock the next morning, Lin Heng opened his eyes and turned his head to look at his wife. She just turned her head to look at him.

The two smiled at each other, their eyes full of love. Lin Heng tidied his wife's hair and touched her smooth face. She kissed him and gave him a good morning kiss, then sat up with a smile.

The two got up together and went to the kitchen to see the dove leaf fairy tofu made yesterday.

The color was emerald green, and if you look closely, you can see some tiny bubbles and very tiny dove leaf residues.

Xiulan stretched out her finger and pressed it. It was very elastic. She turned back and said with a smile: "It's done. Do you want to eat it in the morning?"

"Yes." Lin Heng nodded.

"Then I'll cut it for you." Xiulan said with a smile, washed her hands and cut the fairy tofu with a knife.

Take out a piece and cut it into small slices half a centimeter thick, and freeze the rest in water to extend the shelf life.

After cutting, add some chopped green onions, garlic and chili, red oil from chili oil, add aged vinegar, soy sauce, and a little sesame oil and stir gently, and a piece of fairy tofu with color, aroma and taste is ready.

"Try it!"

Xiulan handed the chopsticks to Lin Heng.

Lin Heng picked up a piece with chopsticks, just like picking up pig skin jelly, it was a test of skill.

Pick up a piece and put it in his mouth, Lin Heng couldn't help showing an intoxicated expression: "Delicious!"

The taste is fragrant, and the taste is softer than jelly, similar to pig skin jelly.

It tastes with the unique cool aroma of fairy leaves, and it is perfect when mixed with vinegar and chili.

"Try one too." Lin Heng picked up another one for his wife.

Xiulan opened her mouth and ate a piece, and a happy smile appeared on her face: "It's really good. The small leaves are much better than the big leaves, and not bitter at all."

The two of them finished the small pot one by one. This thing is just like jelly. Not only does it have to taste good, but the cold mixing technique is also very important, and Xiulan's craftsmanship is worthy of praise.

Lin Heng thought about digging a tree and planting it in the yard one day, so he wouldn't have to compete with others to pick it.

After eating the fairy tofu, the two washed their faces, Xiulan made breakfast, and Lin Heng went to feed the chickens and ducks.

"Do you want my help to dig the fish pond in the morning?" Xiulan asked while eating.

Lin Heng shook his head: "No, you don't even have to cook, just deliver water."

This time, 20 workers were called to dig the fish pond. The daily wage for each person was 80 cents, which was much higher than the normal wage in the countryside, so no matter how much food you eat, you have to bring your own tools.

Even so, there are still a lot of people who sign up, because rural people usually help each other, and there are few jobs that can make money.

In the end, the village party secretary Tian Dongfu picked 20 people who were experienced and strong, and did not usually cheat and play tricks.

"Okay." Xiulan nodded and fed Xiaoxia a mouthful of noodles.

"Dong Dongdong!"

Before the two finished their meal, the door was knocked. Lin Heng was wondering who came so early, and there was a call from outside the door: "Cousin, it's me, Lin Hai."

"I'll go open the door." Lin Heng put down his bowl and stood up.

"What are you doing here? What's the matter?" Lin Heng opened the door and asked curiously. Lin Hai was not among the workers he hired.

"Cousin, my dad asked me to come and help you, and by the way, I'll take a bag of plums we picked yesterday for you and sister-in-law to taste."

Lin Hai said while showing what he had in his hand, a full six or seven pounds of Sichuan plums.

"No need, I have enough manpower, and I can't finish all the plums you take." Lin Heng shook his head and took him into the house.

"I don't have much to do, I'll help you, no money, just a meal." Lin Hai said with a smile, Lin Heng had done him such a favor even if his parents didn't ask him to come.

"Have you had breakfast?" Lin Heng looked at him and asked.

"Yes, I had mixed soup." Lin Hai nodded.

Poured a glass of water for Lin Hai, and Lin Heng chatted with him while eating.

After dinner, Lin Heng ate a plum. This plum was the Sichuan crispy plum, which tasted crispy and sweet, and the plum pit was easy to remove.

"This plum is good, I love it."

Lin Heng broke a plum, gave the small one to his daughter, and the big one to his wife.

"My dad said you like it, and my family has a lot of plums." Lin Hai said with a smile.

As they were talking, the gate of the yard was pushed open again, and Lin's father and eldest brother came in.

"Dad, eldest brother, why are you here too? There's no need for so many people." Lin Heng said helplessly,

Lin's father looked at him and said, "You are digging a fish pond, and it would be wrong for us not to come. Others will gossip when they see it."

"That's right, the farm work is not very busy these two days, and we have time to help you." Lin Yue also said with a smile.

"Okay then." Lin Heng could only agree.

He prepared all the tools in advance, and even got a braid cannon.

At about 6:40, people arrived one after another. Some of them were holding shovels, some were holding pickaxes, and the most common ones were baskets for carrying soil, and two wooden carts.

Lin Heng took out the workbook and asked everyone to come up and sign, once when they came in the morning and once when they left in the afternoon.

Putting the workbook away, Lin Heng smiled and said, "Okay, I'll trouble you all for the next few days. Don't worry about the wages. We will settle the wages on the day of completion, and there will be no arrears."

After a pause, he became serious: "But I have said it in advance. The wages I give are definitely high enough. So I hope everyone will take it seriously. I don't want anything unpleasant to happen."

"Lin Heng, don't worry, no one will cheat if the wages are paid."

"Yes, if he is caught, you don't need to say it, we will all kick him out directly. There are many people who don't want to do it."

"Don't worry, the wages are paid, we will treat it as if we are working for our own family."

A group of people echoed one after another. What they were most worried about was the wages. With Lin Heng's face-to-face promise, they felt relieved.

"Let's go." Lin Heng nodded and walked in front of everyone.

Everyone came out with tools and followed Lin Heng.

Soon they arrived at the wheat field of Hongfeng Mountain. Lin Hai took out a lighter and lit the firecrackers. After a crackling sound, they could start working.

Lin Heng watched everyone assign work: "Everyone help pull out the wormwood on the wheat field first, and remove the grass on the roadside under the ground. After I spread the line, everyone can work."

A group of people dispersed to weed and work, and Lin Heng assigned corresponding work to each of them.

After arranging the workers, Lin Heng looked at his father, elder brother and cousin and said, "Help me spread the line."

"Okay." Lin's father nodded, feeling that Lin Heng commanded people like a boss, and maybe this fish pond could really be built.

After careful consideration, Lin Heng decided to dig two fish ponds, both of which were one acre in size.

Two are next to each other, with a one-meter gap in between.

The 20 acres of land at the bottom of Hongfeng Mountain is about 400 meters long and more than 30 meters wide, forming a trapezoid.

The wheat field is just a location at the foot of the easternmost mountain. If the fish pond is calculated as one acre of 50 meters long and 13 meters wide, at least seven fish ponds can be arranged from the east to the west.

Today's purpose is mainly to level the land. Although it is only a dozen degrees, the slope must be leveled to dig fish ponds. It is unrealistic for all fish ponds to have a flat surface, but it is still possible to make each row flat.

After the calculation, nail the stakes and pull the line, and then let the workers start working, pour the soil out of the land and level the land first.

On a land of 100 meters long and 15 meters wide, more than 20 people are not crowded at all.

However, Lin Heng is not going to recruit more people. It is too difficult to manage too many people. Anyway, there is no rush, so take your time.

Looking at the people working, Lin Heng did not consider looking for an excavator at the beginning.

But it is too difficult to find an excavator in this era. They are as rare as pandas. Most of them are state-owned and private individuals cannot afford them.

And even if you can find one, the cost is very high, not as cheap as manpower. After thinking about it, I decided to dig manually.

And there is another advantage of using people to dig. It can increase jobs in the village and enhance prestige.

Everyone makes a living under you, so they will naturally respect you, support you, and don’t want to lose their jobs.

If you rely on excavators, the villagers will not benefit at all. Maybe someone will be jealous and poison you when you raise fish.

With manpower, everyone can make money. Even if someone wants to cause damage, most people will actively help, and it is easy to catch those who cause damage.

Taking all factors into consideration, manpower is cheap and convenient, and it can also establish prestige and reputation. Why not do it?

Lin Heng did not work, mainly inspecting and guiding, and went back to get a few pots of water in the middle.

Let people go off work on time at 12 noon to eat, and work from 2 pm to 6 pm.

It has to be said that rural people have good labor. Lin Heng originally estimated that it would take two days to complete the fish pond leveling work, but he had already completed most of it in one day.

The rest was probably finished in half a morning.

In the evening, Xiulan cooked dishes, and Lin Heng's father, elder brother, and cousin Lin Hai ate and drank.

Lin's mother, sister-in-law, and others did not come. When they were called, they had already eaten. At noon, Xiulan sent them some fairy tofu.

After dinner, when everyone left, Lin Heng helped clean up the dishes while talking to his wife about today's progress.

"That's pretty fast. How long do you think it will take to dig out the two ponds?" Xiulan asked curiously.

"It will take half a month to dig them out. If you work slowly, it may take 20 days." Lin Heng said.

After all, it is a pond of two acres and two and a half meters deep. The workload is still very large.

Xiulan nodded and said, "Then you can't go hunting in the mountains for a month."

"Wait until the weather is cooler. You can't keep the prey now. Let the prey grow their bodies first." Lin Heng said with a smile.

Although the beginning of autumn has passed, the temperature has not dropped at all. Instead, it has become hotter.

The next morning, the surface of the two acres of ponds was leveled.

In the afternoon, Lin Heng spread the outline of the pond. The outer bank of the pond was left two meters wide. After hardening, cars can enter. The banks in the other three directions were only one meter wide.

After the outer circle was determined, the slope around the pond had to be determined. Because this place was sandy, Lin Heng chose a gentle slope of 1:3.

After the lines were spread and wooden stakes were nailed, excavation could begin. Twelve people dug and eight people transported the soil.

The excavated soil was first used to fill some gaps in the ground, and the excess was used to pave the road, or directly poured into the forest under the road on the west side.

The forest under the westernmost road was a steep slope, which was very convenient to pour down. At the bottom was a large area of ​​thorn vines, and there was no cropland, so it would not cause any impact.

Moreover, this forest now also belonged to the Lin family. It was only a few hundred meters below to the Shiban River. Lin Heng felt that pouring these soils could fill the road a little wider, which would benefit others and himself.

Once these were determined, the daily work became very repetitive, just digging soil and digging soil.

Lin Heng was originally worried that the soil here was not good enough and needed to be laid with a waterproof membrane, but after digging fifty centimeters, the soft sandy soil disappeared, and the bottom was all very solid clay.

This was great news for Lin Heng. Clay has good water retention and almost no leakage after compaction. Fish ponds can be raised directly without laying waterproof membranes.

After the work on the construction site stabilized, Lin Heng handed it over to his father, elder brother and cousin to take care of it, and he went to the town.

Although he wrote a plan for the Tuanjie Brick Factory, some things still need to be guided in person.

Fortunately, the owner of the brick factory was still a human being and gave the brick-pulling horse to Lin Heng as a mount.

"Go!"

Lin Heng rode the horse back. The horse had no saddle or stirrups. He dared not move when riding, and almost lay on the horse's back.

The next day when he went to the town, he fell down. Fortunately, the horse was not fast, and only his waist hurt.

"Really, you are not careful. Look at your waist, it is bruised and black."

In the evening, Xiulan said distressedly when she massaged Lin Heng with safflower oil.

Lin Heng endured the pain and smiled: "It's okay, it's just like riding a bicycle. You can't ride it unless you fall a few times. I feel like I've almost learned to ride a horse."

He was thinking about buying two horses when he bought a dairy cow at the end of the year.

I can't afford a motorcycle for the time being, so I can ride a horse when I go hunting in the mountains, or I can ride a horse on the street, or I can get a wooden cart to pull it.

Otherwise, I can't stand walking all the time.

"Be careful, I won't rub you next time." Xiulan gently rubbed Lin Heng to reduce the swelling and warned him.

In the following period, Lin Heng went to the town five or six times and completely finished the technical matters.

Wang Jie also gave the remaining one thousand yuan as promised. He also wrote an IOU for the last one thousand yuan.

"Brother Lin Heng, you have worked hard these days, please stay and have dinner with us tonight." After giving the IOU, Wang Jie smiled and said to keep him.

After these days of contact, he really admired Lin Heng. This person knew the brick factory better than he, the real brick factory owner.

But he couldn't understand why Lin Heng didn't build a brick factory himself when he had the technology.

"I'm really sorry, I have to deal with things when I go back this afternoon. Wait until next time, I'll treat you next time."

Lin Heng said with a smile that he and Wang Jie were in the same boat, and he was too lazy to drink to cultivate feelings. It would be better to go home to accompany his wife and children.

"That's a pity, I can only wait once." Wang Jie didn't try to keep him too much.

Lin Heng walked back slowly, looking here and there, thinking about some things, very leisurely.

In a blink of an eye, it has been ten days since the fish pond was dug. Because there were several big rocks in the middle and it rained for a day, the first fish pond was only dug now.

This morning, Lin Heng came to check and was very satisfied with the overall situation.

The bottom and sides of the fish pond are very flat and have been compacted.

He did not drain the bottom of this fish pond, but installed a drainage outlet at a depth of two meters in the middle. He installed a plastic water pipe with a diameter of 30 bought from the town, which can be drained from here when necessary to prevent overflow when it rains.

It was troublesome to drill a hole for the bottom drain, and he was afraid that it would leak if it was not done well, so he gave up.

On the 18th day of August in the Gregorian calendar, the third day of July in the lunar calendar, which was also the 13th day of digging the fish pond, a big problem occurred.

"Brother, what do you think we should do?" Lin Yue looked at Lin Heng and asked on the construction site.

A group of other workers also looked at him, waiting for him to make a decision.

Halfway through the second fish pond, a big stone appeared in the middle. At first, it was thought to be not very big, but as they dug, they found that it was a large bluestone weighing more than ten tons.

If they wanted to dig it out manually, they had to slowly break it up and then move it out.

"Forget it, just leave it in the fish pond, don't worry about it." Lin Heng waved his hand.

This problem can't be solved now. When we have money in two years, we can clean the pond and let the excavator handle it.

"Okay, let's continue."

The crowd bypassed the big rocks and continued to work, trying to dig out the second fish pond as soon as possible.

On August 19, Lin Heng went to the town to get 200 kilograms of quicklime, smashed it into powder and threw it into the first fish pond for disinfection and sterilization.

Water was led in, flooding 30 centimeters deep, and testing for leaks while disinfecting to make remedial measures.

After observing for two days, Lin Heng was still quite satisfied, and no leaks were found in the clay base.

At present, everything is going well for the first fish pond, and Lin Heng is very happy.

But the second fish pond is a bit of a headache. First, there was a big bluestone, and then when one-third of it was left and it was about to be completed, it rained.

On August 23, a heavy rainstorm fell without warning, and then it turned into continuous rain.

The first fish pond was fine, it was disinfected and drained. The second fish pond was terrible, it hadn’t even been dug out yet, so they had to build a drainage ditch in the rain that afternoon.

The heavy rain in Wumeng covered the entire mountain village, and people hid at home, listening to the rain and watching the sky.

It seemed that no one noticed that it was already the end of August.