Sure enough, there was less ice on the ground at the entrance of the village, and there were obvious signs of being shoveled on the road in the middle, but it was not particularly clean either.
But when you step on it, you won’t feel like you’re going to fall at any time.
It was cold now and not many people in the village were outside, but they still knew that there were many carriages and horses coming to the Zhou family's village outside the village.
When Manbao and the others arrived at the village entrance, the village chief happened to be going out to look for them.
Nothing serious, just saying hello. After all, the villagers are all tenants of the Zhou family, right?
As soon as he saw Manbao and the others, the chief immediately stepped forward and saluted, "See Mr. Zhou."
Man Bao quickly returned the gift. The other party was quite old, and she didn't dare to accept the gift in vain.
The manager smiled and said, "Mr. Zhou, is the whole family coming to Zhuangzi to play?"
Man Bao smiled and nodded, "I heard it snowed here in Yongzhou two days ago, so we came to enjoy the snow."
The chief didn't know what to appreciate about this vast white snow. Doesn't it snow every year? But he still smiled and expressed his welcome.
Now that they have met, Man Bao naturally wants to ask about the situation in the village, "Have all the chickens hatched from the eggs given to you?"
The leader smiled and responded "Yes" and said: "Everyone is very concerned. As long as the hatched chicks are raised, they will be raised in the house and eat and drink like people."
Of course this is impossible, chickens still eat worse than people.
Manbao was very satisfied with this and asked about planting next spring, "It's time to prepare the grain seeds. Does the village plan to replace the grain seeds with new ones this year, or use the ones left at home?"
The head of the village said: "We are thinking of picking out the best part from our home and buying some new grain seeds from the county to replace it. We agreed before that this grain seed..."
"I'll pay half of the money," Man Bao said, "I know. Later I'll have someone go to the grain stores in the city to search carefully to see if there are any particularly good grain seeds."
The manager smiled and agreed, saying that it would be easier to talk to someone who knows how to farm.
Man Bao finally asked about winter matters, such as whether the villagers had prepared enough firewood...
After the village leader said that everyone was well prepared, Manbao immediately offered to buy some firewood from the villagers.
If you ask her, why would you borrow something worth just a few tens of pennies? You can just buy it directly.
Bai Shan thought so too.
The village chief now thought that they were coming to the village to buy firewood.
But the people in the village were all well-to-do tenants, and when she had requests, let alone buying or borrowing, she just asked for them, and the tenants could only give them.
The headman hesitated for a moment and decided to make a good relationship, so he smiled and said: "Isn't it just firewood? It's not worth much money. Where can I buy it? In this way, move a few bundles from my house and I will have people go to each house."
Just a little bit is enough."
Man Bao declined, "This place is far from the mountains and forests, and we have to walk a long way to collect firewood. How can we just get everyone's things?"
Seeing that she was sincere, the head of the village simply pointed it out and said, "It's not a valuable thing. Besides, Mr. Zhou didn't ask for hay this year. We didn't have to do grazing work, so we had time to collect so much firewood. Originally,
We should give you the firewood in the village."
Only then did Man Bao think about the pasture. In previous years, the tenants in the village had to provide pasture to the chief official of the field.
However, they don't have many horses, but they do have a lot of mules, but the former have been raised by Bai Shan and his family, using the best grain and grass, and they don't like the grass here at all;
Zhou Lang is in charge of the latter, and I don't know where he got so much hay. Anyway, the mule is not losing weight, and he can still make a lot of money every day.
Finally, at the insistence of the village chief, Manbao accepted the twenty bundles of firewood he had collected and sent them to the village by the villagers.
When Lao Zhou heard that it was for free, he was very happy. Then he accepted their love and said to Zhou Dalang and his wife: "Don't say it, although they are lazy, they are not bad people. In the future, you should pay more attention to them."
In addition to not letting them be too lazy, it would be great if I could help with other things."
Zhou Dalang agreed and asked: "Dad, are we going back tomorrow afternoon?"
"Why are you here if you don't go back?" Lao Zhoutou asked: "If Mr. Zhuang hadn't said that Man Bao was in a bad mood and wanted to go out to see the snow and climb a mountain to relax, I wouldn't have gone out on this cold day."
Zhou Dalang didn't really want to go back, "I discussed it with my son's mother and wanted to stay in the village and raise some chickens and ducks."
He said: "While we are free now, let's buy some eggs and duck eggs to hatch, and then tidy up other untidy areas in the village."
The main reason is that when they are in the capital, they only help out in the east and help out in the west, so they are very idle.
So Xiao Qian's idea is that it is better to live in Zhuangzi, do things, wait until he misses his parents and children, and then return to the capital, which is not far anyway.
When Lao Zhou was thinking, Zhou Dalang continued to talk: "She also wants to pickle some dried vegetables, fish, meat and the like. The house in the capital looks so good. Occasionally there are distinguished guests coming to the house. If it is on the eaves
I'm afraid it won't be good to dry the meat."
Old Zhoutou thought of the bacon, sausages and various bacon and cured meats made by his eldest daughter-in-law, and immediately nodded and said: "Okay, then you can stay."
After thinking for a while, he said: "Let's stay with you."
Anyway, when he returned to the capital, he went to help in the restaurant, so there wasn't much to do. Man Bao had to go to the palace after he returned, and we had to meet him on the eighth day of the lunar month next month, so he thought about it and said, "Erya and I will want some later."
"Money, let's go buy some meat and vegetables and sit back. This year we are celebrating the New Year in the capital, and there are a lot of people eating there."
Thinking of buying vegetables, Lao Zhoutou complained a little, "We came here too late before and forgot to plant vegetables. From now on, we will have to grow vegetables by ourselves. By the way, is there any land in the village where we can grow vegetables?"
Man Bao, who was sitting obediently waiting for his meal, immediately interrupted and said, "Dad, I need to leave more space in this village for me to grow things."
Old Zhou asked, "Grow the weeds you dug up from outside?"
"Why is it a weed? Maybe it's medicine," Man Bao said, "Everything in the world can be used as medicine. As Li Rucai said, Shopkeeper Zheng has contacted me about a batch of medicinal species. I want to try it in Zhuangzi by then.
Plant something."
Some are also planted in the houses in the capital. If they are planted separately, the survival rate is higher. Shopkeeper Zheng spent a lot of effort to collect these from the medicine farmers.
Of course, in addition to the medicinal seeds given by shopkeeper Zheng, there are also things she is interested in buying from the mall, as well as things she digs out from outside, hehehehe...
There were people coming and going in the big house in the capital, and she didn't dare to plant things from the mall. But here in Zhuangzi, most of the people were her own family, and the eldest brother and sister-in-law took care of it themselves. She felt relieved, so she planned to find some novel things.
Plant on.
For example, Keke said that grain seeds with good genes in the second generation cannot be inherited.