Back to 1984: Earning Money, Raising Kids, and Keeping the Household Busy

Chapter 53 Picking Wild Duck Eggs
Lin Zhi ignored him, his face darkening as he dug at the ground a couple of times, then angrily threw down his hoe. "No way! I'm going to ask my older brother why Lin Qin didn't ask us for help when she built the house, but instead asked that outsider Lin Qingxiang!"

"Yes! Let's go now!" Li Lian said, then quickly asked, "Where does Lin Qin's husband live?"

Lin Zhi was stunned.

The couple looked at Huang Yuzhen and shamelessly asked, "Where does Lin Qin's husband live?"

Huang Yuzhen rolled her eyes. "I've never been there! How would I know?"

“Your husband and son have been working for them, how could you not know?” Li Lian persisted.

Huang Yuzhen was too lazy to pay them any attention.

Lin Zhi and his wife were furious and went to the brigade leader to reason with him, but they were kicked out.

The two men did want to follow Lin Qingxiang and Lin Shaojun, but the father and son left before dawn and walked very fast, which was far beyond the ability of a lazy man like Lin Zhi to keep up with.

The couple searched for three days in a row and came up empty-handed, finally giving up completely.

Meanwhile, Lin Qingxiang and his son, who had just arrived in Nanyu to work for Lin Qin, were telling Lin Yi and Lin Qin about this as a joke.

"The ridiculous sight of Lin Zhi and his wife is truly laughable!"

Lin Yi shook his head and sighed, "My brother is truly hopeless. You say they want my land? How much land do I even have?"

At the beginning of this year, the brigade notified them to allocate land according to the household registration book. He was the only one in his family, and he only received two or three mu in total, which was not even a fraction of the size of Nanyu. I don't know what the point is for them to be so attached to his land!

Lin Qingxiang scoffed, "For that lazybones, two or three acres of land are an asset he could never earn in his entire life. How can he not keep an eye on it? Not everyone is as diligent as you!"

Lin Qin, who was standing to the side, shook her head as she listened, not wanting to continue talking about those awful relatives, so she changed the subject, "Uncle Qingxiang, take a look at the cement I mixed this time, is it usable?"

She's been learning how to mix cement for the past two days. At first, it was either too thin or too dry. If she put too much of any one of the ingredients, she wouldn't know how to mix it.

Fortunately, Lin Qingxiang was an experienced teacher who patiently taught her, and she gradually mastered some of the tricks of the trade.

Lin Qingxiang walked over, stirred it a few times with a shovel, and nodded repeatedly, "It's almost done now, but it's still a bit runny. Just add some more cement."

Once the cement was mixed, everyone immediately started working.

In three days, the foundation in the pit was built, and the next step was to raise it.

As the foundation was built, the money dwindled like water.

Lin Qin could only come over to help for a short while. She still had to go fishing on the fishing boat or collect snails by the Nanxi River, all of which could be sold for money.

When Chen Wenjun returned, Lin Qin was collecting snails by the stream. He put his things on the boat, grabbed his fishing net and bucket, and ran over to work with Lin Qin.

Lin Qin glanced at him, then immediately pointed to a pile of apple snails on the shore, "I just picked these up, I'll break them up and use them as bait for you."

Chen Wenjun was delighted when he saw them. "So many! Where did you find them?"

Lin Qin grinned, "I find it strange too. It seems like whenever I really want to catch something, that thing is everywhere. Look, this morning I was thinking of collecting a couple more baskets of snails to sell, but when I got here I found snails everywhere, like nobody wanted them! They're also really big, so they'll definitely sell well."

Chen Wenjun laughed loudly, "Isn't it because no one's competing with you at this time?"

Lin Qin nodded thoughtfully, "That makes sense! But if wishes could come true, I'd like to find some gold! That way, we wouldn't have to worry about building a house! Hahaha."

"You wish! I work in Nanxi every day and I've never had such a good thing happen to me!" Chen Wenjun looked at the daydreaming Lin Qin with doting eyes, put down the bucket, turned around and found a suitable spot, smashing the apple snails and scattering them there. This action lured out the wild ducks that were hiding in the water plants ten meters away.

Lin Qin's eyes lit up. "Good heavens! It's a wild duck! There must be duck eggs in the grass!"

There have always been wild ducks along the Nanxi River, but like wild birds, they are extremely agile and live in tricky places, so most people can't catch them.

With the weather getting warmer, ducks will definitely lay more eggs.

Chen Wenjun felt the weeds were unsafe, so he pointed to the cracks in the rocks on the bank and said, "You can go over there and take a look. Wild ducks might be laying their eggs there. Don't go into the weeds. I'll get a fishing net, and you can use a bamboo pole to knock down the weeds and see if you can catch some fish."

Those large piles of stones were leftover materials from the construction of the dam. They stretched for dozens of meters along the Nanxi River, and over time, some of them were covered with wild grass.

The irregularly stacked rocks create many gaps of varying sizes, especially in the underwater section, which serves as a natural shelter for crabs, small fish, and shrimp.

Lin Qin enthusiastically carried two large baskets of snails onto the boat and ran to the pile of stones with a bucket.

She hadn't had much hope, but as soon as she climbed onto the pile of stones, she found several white things in the crevices. Upon closer inspection, they turned out to be wild duck eggs!

Some gaps contained three or five, some seven or eight, and even the fewest had two.

It looks like the wild ducks have made this their nest.

She was so excited that she forgot to tell Chen Wenjun and squatted down to concentrate on taking out the duck eggs.

After Chen Wenjun went into the water, he didn't even bother to keep an eye on Lin Qin.

After he scooped up a net full of bamboo shoots, he turned around and saw Lin Qin coming down, so he casually asked, "Did you catch anything?"

Lin Qin carefully climbed down from the pile of stones and ran over to show off her achievement, "How was it?"

Chen Wenjun craned his neck to take a look and was immediately shocked, "More than half a bucket! How could there be so much?"

Lin Qin shrugged. "I don't know either. How's your harvest going?"

As she spoke, she walked to the bucket and found at least a dozen bamboo shoots inside. She immediately smiled and said, "Looks like I can still go to Guoxing Hotel this afternoon!"

Chen Wenjun grinned and waded closer to the water plants. "Come on! Let's see if we find anything this time before deciding whether to make another trip this afternoon."

Lin Qin immediately put down the bucket, picked up the bamboo pole she had brought from the boat, and strode confidently onto the embankment.

Seeing that Chen Wenjun had already opened the fishing net to block a patch of water plants.

She lowered a bamboo pole and began to beat the water plants wildly, startling a flock of wild ducks hiding there. Fish also jumped out of the plants, and the water surface seemed to boil for a moment.

Lin Qin exclaimed, "What a big fish! It's a grass carp, isn't it?"

Chen Wenjun quickly moved in that direction to block the net. After a while, he noticed something unusual in the net. It looked like something big was rushing into the net. The water at his feet was already murky, but he could still see dark shadows rushing into the net.

Chen Wenjun waited patiently for a while, and only when it was almost time did he lift the bamboo pole up.

Standing on high ground, Lin Qin could see the fish belly white occasionally rising in the fishing net. She was stunned and realized that Chen Wenjun couldn't handle it by himself, so she quickly shouted, "Don't move, I'll get a bucket to help!"

(End of this chapter)