jdhmnovel Chapter 90
Chapter 90
Zhou Yuren was intimidated by Zhao Dage, and he dared not disobey Zhao Dage now. So he readily agreed and then asked Zhao Dage's cousin, Zhou Tianfu, to report the situation to his uncles, so that they could prepare to teach Zhao Tiesheng's group a lesson when Zhao Tiesheng and his group went to pick up Cheng Jinxiang.
Zhou Yuren patted his chest: Luckily, I didn't agree to Zhao Tiesheng's request to pick up the person, otherwise I would have been the one to get beaten up on this trip.
“Uncle, I’m thinking that going up the mountain to move stones and stuff is really slow. This isn’t a big house, it’s just a shack to keep us warm while we work. So I was thinking, should we think of some other way to make that shack both warm and easy?” Zhao Da’e asked.
Zhou Yuren thought for a moment: "Other methods? What other methods are there? Without building a wall, the plastic sheeting won't last more than a few days before it's blown away by the strong wind. If you want to find a solution... let me think. Taking some things to block the sides is a good idea. But not building a wall is a bit unrealistic and difficult to do."
“We’re using way too many stones to build this wall. Like you said, forty or fifty cubic meters of stones. You can only manage to get one cubic meter in a whole day. What are we going to do?” Zhao Da’e was troubled. This thing required too many materials.
"We need to find more people," Zhou Yuren said honestly. This is something you can't and shouldn't be lazy about; it all depends on having people. If you want to get things done quickly and finish early, you have to have more people.
But even hiring a tractor wouldn't help with the job of moving stones; the stones on the mountain won't just fall into the truck by themselves, right? Someone still needs to move the stones. Moving stones is too tiring work, so hiring help isn't very practical.
But we can't do it without help. One person can only work for one cubic meter a day. Fifty or sixty cubic meters would take more than two months. If there are ten people, it might only take seven or eight days. The more people you have, the less time it will take.
Zhao Da'e glanced at the people who came to help today and saw that there were about twenty or thirty people. But building the shed was easy and the food was decent. As soon as they heard about the sauerkraut stew with fatty pork, they all rushed to come. But this stuff costs more than a hundred yuan for two meals.
After thinking it over, Zhao Da'e made a snap decision and stamped his foot: "Uncle, why don't we buy a pig, slaughter it, and hire a few more people to help? That way we'll have enough labor."
"No need, I'll do it myself. How much does a pig cost? Five or six hundred? And then there are the vegetables, the alcohol, the cigarettes, all of that costs money. It's too expensive. Your shed isn't even worth a thousand or eighty thousand, so it's not worth it to spend a thousand or eighty thousand building the walls."
“Uncle, I’ve suddenly thought of an idea,” Zhao Da’e said. “We can drag the clay bricks along the edge of that plastic sheet, and then build a wall from there, right?”
“Our room is over 50 square meters. We can put three molds per square meter, which means we have 150 blanks. After we finish shaping them during the day, we heat them over a charcoal fire. Once they’re slightly dry, we put them outside. That’s about 300 blanks in total. We make 50 blanks per batch. We can make two or three batches a day, and we can finish the job in two days. It’s fast and saves money.”
Zhao Da'e's explanation was very logical, and Zhou Yuren agreed with this approach.
After discussing it, the next day Zhao Da'e went to find his second brother Zeng Chenglei from the upper courtyard to help with the work. He also asked his eldest cousin Zhou Tianfu to stay behind instead of going out to collect scrap. There were also free laborers Zhao Tingxu and Zhao Laosan. Zhao Da'e felt that if the two of them didn't work, they were just eating for free.
Zhao Da'e promised to cook a meal of sauerkraut, pork, blood sausage, and tofu for Grandpa and Third Uncle at noon, which would solve their problem of not liking to work. Besides, they could drink as much alcohol as they wanted.
The meals that Zhao Da'e hired help with were quite good.
Several of his cousins and Zhou Yuren's two nephews also went, making a group of more than ten people. They worked in that plastic shed, hauling clay bricks.