Wei and Jin cooks

Zhao Mingming went to the household room, Fan Lianyin went to the ceremonial room, where he was mainly responsible for education, and Zu Daozhong went to the catching room to work as an errand.

Generally speaking, the three of them can't work together.

The work that can be done together must be extremely hard and very easy to go wrong.

Zhao Mingming did not expect that she would be involved in a multi-department cooperation official matter just two months after joining the company and getting familiar with this small area of ​​​​the county.

The imperial court has issued an order to collect statistics on the country's population, acres of cultivated land, and housing this year.

To put it bluntly, it is to conduct comprehensive statistics on the national population and cultivated land.

Since the founding of the People's Republic of China, China has conducted statistics twice, and this is the third time.

As a petty official in the Hufang, Zhao Mingming had to go down to the grassroots level to do statistics. Because of the shortage of manpower, the Hufang deployed people from other houses.

Fan Lianyin, a newcomer to the ceremony room, was the first person to be assigned as a coolie, and Daozhong, the ancestor of the prisoner, was naturally not spared either.

The three of them returned to the office with a pile of brochures and found that the boxes they had just brought back this morning were empty again.

No matter how good-tempered Zhao Mingming was, he couldn't help but burst out. He slammed the book on the desk, pinched his waist and asked, "Where is the white book?"

The old official who was working hard raised his head to look at her and said casually: "Everyone has taken it away."

Zhao Mingming: "I brought that white book back."

The old official ignored her.

Zhao Mingming was so angry that she was spinning around in circles. Fan Lianyin and Zu Daozhong quickly comforted her.

Zhao Mingming looked at the empty box and laughed.

When the officials in the room heard her laughter, they couldn't help but look up from their desks to look at her. Is this person crazy?

Zhao Mingming seemed to have thought of something funny. He pinched his waist and burst into laughter, laughing so hard that tears flowed out.

Now even Fan Lianyin and Zu Daozhong looked at her worriedly. Wouldn't the Crown Princess be mad at her?

Zhao Mingming finished laughing, exhaled a breath, and said solemnly to Fan Lianyin: "Let's go, let's get some more white books back."

The so-called white book is a blank white paper booklet. It is a commonly used office supply and the fastest consumed office supply in every yamen.

Before Zhao Mingming entered the county government office, he had no idea that there were so many ways to consume a white book.

Paper, paper is cheap. Not only tree bark can be used to make paper, but also straw, wheat straw, bamboo, and sugarcane bark can be used to make paper. Therefore, paper is cheap in the world now. You can buy one for five cents, or a hundred sheets for one knife.

This is ordinary writing paper.

Other papers differ in size, hardness, etc., and have different prices, but paper for office writing is only considered affordable, no matter how expensive it is.

So she doesn't think there is a conflict of interest in paper.

But when I entered the house, I realized that paper had great benefits in the county government.

Let’s not talk about the supplier problem behind the paper. Let’s talk about the consumption of white books in this household. That is, every box is moved but not a box is left.

There is one in each household, and the blank paper that is moved home from here is enough for three generations of descendants to use for three lifetimes.

These papers were all purchased from the county government's finances.

Zhao Mingming heard their chief bookkeeper and county magistrate complain more than once, saying that the county government consumes too much white paper and the cost is too high;

She also saw the steward of the paper mill in front of the house more than once, who came to collect debts. It was obviously the money owed to the paper mill by the county government, but the steward of the paper mill had to grovel to ask for the debt. In the end, the person who owed money became the uncle.

Zhao Mingming went to get the white book again. This time she didn't move it back box by box. She received ten volumes, and gave three volumes to Fan Lianyin and Zu Daozhong respectively. She took four volumes herself, collected pens and ink, and went out.

Because she was a bit prickly, the officials in the household rejected her and gave her the most miserable and distant villages.

As newcomers, Fan Lianyin and Zu Daozhong were assigned to bad places, not far from her place.

The yamen has regulations that when counting population and property, more than two officials must accompany each time, otherwise the data will not be accurate.

So the three of them simply made an appointment to act together.

The three of them took their newly-collared white papers and went to the countryside. They might not be able to come back for ten days and a half months. The three of them went back and prepared a lot of dry food. They also brought some food with them, and then they took their own Go to the countryside.

The county government didn't take their departure seriously. The three little thorns had just entered the industry and thought they were righteous, but they didn't know how disgusting they were.

Didn't they just use more paper?

It's not like you spent too much money.

Zhao Mingming rode on the horse and said to Fan Lianyin: "I am so incompetent. I can't even manage a house, let alone the entire country. No wonder my mother asked me to go to the grassroots level to gain experience."

Fan Lianyin said: "How can you blame the lady? Due to your status, you are not a superior person, so they will not listen to you."

"Yes," Zhao Mingming held the reins and said, "So, I want to be their head! However, even if I am not the owner of the household now, I have to put a stop to this trend."

Fan Lianyin nodded repeatedly, "I listen to the queen!"

Zu Daozhong also nodded.

Zhao Mingming said: "Let's finish the errands at hand first, and wait until we come back from the countryside, hum!"

Her boss is the chief bookkeeper. In order to win his attention, she must first complete the most important national population and property inventory work at the moment.

Only by walking up to the chief registrar and registering with him can we attack the customs of the household and even the county government.

Of course, she could also directly bypass the chief registrar, county magistrate, county warden and other superiors and directly make suggestions to the court to rectify the administration, but in that case it would be from top to bottom. What is the difference between her mother's rectification of the administration in the past?

She wanted to change the approach this time, and also wanted to see how many ways there were to rectify the administration of officials.

When he was in the household room, it was precisely because he figured this out that Zhao Mingming laughed out loud, and the depression of the past few days dissipated.

"Let's go to the countryside!" Zhao Mingming flicked his whip and ran ahead.

Fan Lianyin and Zu Daozhong quickly followed.

When they arrived at the place, they had to find Li Zheng first and let him take them to the village.

Some Li Zheng would follow them all the way, and some happened to be busy in the fields. Zhao Mingming and the three of them were tender-faced, so Li Zheng simply led them to the village, and he ran to work in the fields. "If you don't go, My mother-in-law wants to scratch me."

Zhao Mingming didn't force it and let him go.

She took Bai Ce's family to look for them, but it was the busy farming season. During the day, there were not many people in every house. Those who stayed at home were either children or old people who could no longer work. To ask questions, they had to shout. .

When Zhao Mingming saw it, he simply stopped asking from door to door. He put the white book in his pocket and ran to the fields to see people harvesting wheat.

She squatted aside and watched for a while, then chose an old man to help. She took out a sickle from nowhere, lifted her robe, and went to the ground to help cut the wheat.

She went to the fields with Zhao Hanzhang every year, and she could easily get these farm tasks at her fingertips, and she quickly became involved with the farmers in the fields.

Fan Lianyin and Zu Daozhong were her friends. Every year when the emperor encouraged farmers to teach and set an example in the fields, they would follow suit, so they would do it.

The three of them quickly blended in. When they returned from work in the evening, everyone in the village knew that people from above were coming to count the population and fields. Because they couldn't find anyone, they cut wheat with them in the fields for a day.

In the evening, the villagers warmly entertained the three of them, and the three of them divided the food they brought into their rations and handed them over.

The villagers quickly refused, "We are all here, how can we ask you to provide food? Isn't this making us miserable?"

"That's right, the year is good now, and there is plenty of food at home. I don't have to worry about food. I have enough food."

But Zhao Mingming insisted on giving it, saying: "This is the rule of the imperial court. Officials who go to the countryside must bring their own rations and are not allowed to eat or ask for food from the people. Once discovered, we will be impeached and held accountable."

The villagers also know that this rule exists, but...only the officials who came down a few years ago will still abide by it. In recent years, everyone has become much more relaxed in this regard.

Seeing that the three young men were shouting, and they looked like officials who had gone to the countryside in the early years, the villagers smiled slightly and accepted their food rations tolerantly without embarrassing them.

However, one villager came out with a knife and killed a chicken to add to their meal. He said happily to the wide-eyed three people: "No one has come to our village for many years. Today, we are happy to eat chicken." (End of chapter)