On this day, before the work started, the goose stew in the iron pot for the evening was arranged.

At this time, Yang Yufeng, as the host, called Zhao Chun to carry the child into the house, and asked Xiao Lingdang to take her three aunts to school.

Zhao Chun didn't want to enter the house and wanted to watch the excitement outside, but the child in her arms couldn't stay, so she carried the child and the old lady into Zhang's house first.

In the southeast corner of the Zhang Family Courtyard, there is an open shed. There is nothing else in the shed except a stone mill that lacks the upper millstone.

A pair of stone mills has two grinding discs, also known as two fans. The lower fan does not move and the upper fan moves. There are teeth on the contact surfaces of these two grinding discs, so that when the upper grinding disc is rotated, the grinding will leak into the two grinding discs.

Grain between millstones.

If it is a small mill, there will be only one hole on the upper millstone for grain leakage. But the mill now owned by the Zhang family is a large mill, and there should be two holes on the upper millstone for grain leakage.

But the problem now is not that there are a few holes in the upper millstone, but that the Zhangjia stone mill is missing the upper millstone.

"Feng!" When Wang Meilan led the donkey to the vegetable garden of the other courtyard, she turned to Yang Yufeng and said, "You, Xiaojun, and the ministers can go and invite Mopan back."

"Hey!" Yang Yufeng responded and walked out of the courtyard with Zhao Jun and Jie Chen.

When they arrived outside the hospital, Jie Chen drove, Zhao Jun got into the trunk, and Yang Yufeng got into the passenger seat. The car started and headed straight to Tuntungtou.

They were following Wang Meilan's instructions to bring Mopan back.

As the old saying goes: The winds vary a hundred miles apart, and the customs vary across a thousand miles.

In places like Shandong and Northeast China where pasta is popular, almost every household had a stone mill or stone roller in the early years.

Among the older generation, the millstone is called the green dragon and the grinding wheel is called the white tiger, both of which have their own meanings.

In Yong'an, the rules of the elders are that white tigers cannot overwhelm Qinglong, and Qinglong and white tigers cannot stay at home.

The millstones and grinding wheels should not be placed in your own home. Otherwise, during New Years and holidays, when people are sleeping in the house, they will hear the sound of millstones and weights turning.

According to the elders, this is the blue dragon and the white tiger is thinking about people.

Since it has something to say, if you don’t put it in your own home, but put it in someone else’s home, others won’t be happy either.

If you live in a town, pay attention to transporting this thing out of the street (gāi), and after walking a hundred steps out of the street, find a low-lying place to place it.

The Zhao family lives in a village. According to local custom, the green dragon faces east and the white tiger faces west. Therefore, the millstones are generally at the east end of the village and the rolling weights are at the west end.

In this way, the car quickly left the village and walked for another three to five minutes to a poplar forest.

There was a ditch between the road and the edge of the woods. After Yang Yufeng got off the car, she stroked the edge of the ditch and looked at the poplar trees on the other side of the ditch from south to north.

On many of the poplar trees, there are marks left by axes and chisels, which are the marks left by the millstones placed by each household.

After Yang Yufeng walked 17 or 18 meters and stopped, Jie Chen, who was following behind, quickly stepped on the brakes, and then he and Zhao Jun both got out of the car.

When the two of them walked behind Yang Yufeng, when they saw the word "Shu" carved crookedly and loosely on the poplar tree, Zhao Jun and Jie Chen looked at each other and smiled silently.

At this time, Yang Yufeng stood facing the poplar tree, crossed her hands in front of her chest, muttered a few words with her eyes closed, and then called to Zhao Jun to relieve his ministers and go down the ditch.

The two men went down into the ditch and moved the snow to reveal the millstone inside. Zhao Jun and Jie Chen could not lift the big millstone, but they worked together to lift one side.

After lifting the millstone, put the iron chain through the eyelet to tie the millstone and tie it behind the car.

The next step was simple. After the three of them got in the car, Jie Chen started the car and pulled the millstone back.

After entering the village, Zhao Jun got out of the trunk of the car and followed the car back.

Along the way, Zhao Jun saw a young and strong man and asked him to follow him. The millstone could be pulled home by a cart, but it had to be carried by someone to put it on top of the mill.

"Xiaojun!" When passing by Old Wei's house, Wei Tie, who was coming out of the hut, saw Zhao Jun and shouted, "What are you going to do?"

Before Zhao Jun could answer, Liu Hanshan answered for him: "Let's go, Tiezi, help Zhao Jun carry the millstone."

"Wait while I get a pair of gloves!" Wei Tie said, running back to his yard, going to the warehouse to get a pair of gloves and coming out to join the team.

In this way, when Zhao Jun approached Zhang's house, eight people were already following him.

Seven of them, even if some were not invited by Zhao Jun, they were all recognized by him.

But there was only one person who looked at Zhao Jun and was stunned.

"Ouch!" Zhao Jun frowned, looked at the boy and asked, "Little brother, you don't go to school, what are you doing here?"

As soon as Zhao Jun finished speaking, Wei Tie laughed and said, "Isn't it right for my brother-in-law to help my brother-in-law work?"

The person who got into the crowd was none other than Ma Yang. This kid was wearing a dog-skin hat crookedly, looking carefree.

When Zhao Jun asked him what he was doing here, Ma Yang glanced at Liu Hanshan next to him and said, "I just heard you call me Lao Zhu, my second brother, and you said you wanted to find someone strong to carry the millstone with you."

After saying this, Ma Yang slapped his chest with his backhand and said, "I'll be tough!"

Zhao Jun: "..."

Zhao Jun was speechless, and everyone laughed. Liu Hanshan pulled off the sleeve of his cotton-padded jacket and said with a smile: "Boy, your hair hasn't even grown yet. What a solid person you are!"

When Liu Hanshan said this, his laughter became even louder. Zhao Jun raised his hand to stop Ma Yang and said, "You go to school quickly. We are enough and we don't need you."

In front of outsiders, Ma Yang behaved well, said "Oh" and left.

Looking at his brother-in-law's retreating back, Zhao Jun couldn't help but shake his head secretly. Why are you still clamoring to take the college entrance exam just this day?

As Zhao Jun said, it is enough for these people to add him and the ministers to carry the millstone.

After putting the millstone back, Wang Meilan thanked everyone who had always helped. Zhao Jun also took a pack of Spring Festival cigarettes from Jie Chen, lit one for each person, and put one in each person's ear.

This time was different from the last time we fought with the Gu family. It was completely normal for a rural person to help out by carrying the millstone.

When Zhao Jun went to ask for the millstone, Wang Meilan and the others were not idle here. After they tied the donkey up, they threw snow on the donkey.

This is not animal cruelty. After the snow is thrown up, it is swept away with a broom.

This is a way to remove ashes from the donkey. This method was thought up by Wang Meilan. She said that her father, Wang Dapapa, had a sable scarf before, and every year when it snowed, he would roll the scarf in the snow for the purpose of cleaning it.

This method is exactly the same as the way Northeastern people cleaned minks and woolen sweaters more than ten years later.

At this time, after the millstone was installed, Jin Xiaomei and Xu Chunyan took clean brooms and kept sweeping the millstone.

Yang Yufeng used a shovel to gather snow and spread it around the stone mill. This way, when the donkey turned back and forth, its hooves stepping on the snow would not bring up the dust on the ground.

Seeing this scene, the people who came to help were very surprised. Their families also made sticky bean buns and grinded yellow rice every year, but they had to do it manually. And for a big grinder like this, two people are needed to push it.

"Huh?" At this time, Wei Tie asked Zhao Jun: "Did he buy this house from those two gangsters?"

"Yes." Zhao Jun nodded and said, "I bought it from Minister Li, from Li Erchen."

We are all from the same village, how can Wei Tie not know who owns this house? His question just now is not important, and then Wei Tie pointed to the stone mill and said: "The two brothers live in Qian'er, so they didn't ask Qinglong to leave."

?”

"That's not the case." Zhao Jun said, "I, Brother Zhang, invited them out after I bought their house."

"Tsk!" After hearing Zhao Jun's words, a man named Zhu Changgui next to him smacked his lips and said: "This house in his house was bought by Mr. Li from the original Liu Da Lai before Liu Da Lai moved away.

I remember clearly that they invited the millstone back and left after grinding all the grain for the family."

"Oh my god." As soon as Zhu Changgui finished speaking, Wei Tie laughed and said, "You have such a good memory. How many years has it been since Liu Da Cripple moved away?"

"Four years!" Zhu Changgui said: "It's not that I have a good memory, I just remembered that they ground the grain before they left, used the sledge to pull back the millstone, and asked me to move it with them."

After saying this, Zhu Changgui held his cigarette and rubbed the stone with his hand, and said: "After that, Mr. Li bought Liu Da Laizi's yard, but he didn't invite the millstone away."

At this point, Zhu Changgui glanced around and then continued: "Look at Mr. Li, after buying this courtyard, it will be gone after the New Year. And his two sons, nothing happened in the past two years, right?

"

After hearing what he said, everyone started talking. Some people said that millstones were indeed not allowed to be placed at home. Others said that a few years ago, a family in Yongli Village covered an abandoned well with millstones. As a result, the millstones in the village

Many animals died inexplicably.

Later, Mrs. Han went to see it and asked the millstone to go away.

The old Mrs. Han was punished because of this incident.

The more everyone talked, the more mysterious it became. The more Zhao Jun heard it, the more interesting it became. For the gunners who were attacking the besiegers, especially the big ones, nothing could touch them. Zhao Jun was not afraid of anything, but Zhao Jun still chose to believe in these things.

.Because in this way, when you brag to others, you can highlight your invulnerability to evil.

After smoking a cigarette, everyone who came to help ended the conversation and left one after another, except Liu Hanshan.

"Brother!" Wang Meilan saw that Liu Hanshan stayed because he had something to do, so she asked him: "What have you been busy with recently?"

Wang Meilan could still talk to Liu Hanshan's daughter-in-law, but she couldn't talk to Liu Hanshan, so she thought of chatting about family matters first. But what she didn't expect was that Wang Meilan got straight to the point.

Hearing her question, Liu Hanshan smiled bitterly and said, "Oh, sister-in-law, I haven't done anything recently, I just sit around."

When winter comes, there is no work in the fields, and there are many people staying in the countryside. But Liu Hanshan said, "Just wait and see." It can be seen that he is dissatisfied with the current situation.

"Uncle Liu." Zhao Jun asked, "Are you going to let Du Chunjiang work?"

This Liu Hanshan used to work in Lengchang 77 and had a good relationship with Du Chunjiang and his younger brother Du Chunlin. The two of them even went to dig up hunting dogs killed in battle to skin and eat the meat, so Xu Changlin almost died with one shot.

Hearing Zhao Jun mention Du Chunjiang, Liu Hanshan shook his head and said: "I used to work at No. 77. Song Tiemin arranged it for me. Aren't I from our forest farm? Now the management is strict and no outsiders are allowed to be employed.

, I won’t be able to survive this winter.”

Song Tiemin was Li Dayong's apprentice, and the two of them worked together when Zhao Jun returned to Lengchang in 77 Lengchang.

Song Tiemin's family was also in Yong'an Village, and it was normal for a relative from the village to arrange a temporary job for Liu Hanshan.

But starting from this year, people in Guileng must be officially employed as Guileng forest farm workers, so Liu Hanshan is unemployed.
To be continued...