"One little flower, one little Tibetan fox, come on, open your mouth."
Lu Fangfang sat in the yard and fed the remaining quail eggs to the two little ones.
"Fangfang? Fangfang? Open the door."
Hearing her husband calling from outside the courtyard, she quickly got up and opened the gate.
Outside, Zhuang Mingcheng was carrying a bag of cement and holding a stack of roof tiles in his arms.
"You bought it so quickly?"
Seeing this, Lu Fangfang quickly took the roof tile from his arms.
"Yes, the tiles and glass have been bought, as well as the thermometer you requested. They're all at the breeding farm. I'll have them put the tiles on the incubation room this afternoon."
Zhuang Mingcheng put down the lime, went out again, and brought back all the remaining ridge tiles.
The two of them weren't in a hurry to eat lunch. They mixed some lime and wiped the surface of the heated kang (a traditional Chinese bed-stove) in the inner room.
The exposed yellow mud looked really ugly, but after applying a layer of lime, it immediately looked much better.
As for the flue of the heated kang (a traditional heated brick bed), that's a big job that can't be done in a short time; we'll have to find another time.
After lunch, the two went to the farm.
Lu Fangfang spent the entire afternoon busy in the incubation room.
The quail eggs from the provincial capital will be delivered tomorrow, and we need to start incubating them immediately. We need to prepare the incubation room and tools.
Two coal stoves, two thermometers, and a cotton quilt lined with quail eggs...
Fearing that the large pot made of yellow mud wouldn't be sturdy, she mixed some cement and applied it to the surface.
There was still a lid missing, so she asked a soldier who knew carpentry to make a large wooden lid for use when incubating the eggs.
They worked until dark, and the entire incubation room, including the wooden door, was finally barely usable.
...
The next day, Lu Fangfang didn't go to the breeding farm. Instead, she went to the regiment early in the morning to wait for the quail eggs.
At ten o'clock, the quail eggs I bought in the provincial capital finally arrived. There were more than five hundred quail eggs, which looked quite impressive.
She asked the soldiers to take the quail eggs to the incubation room, then went back to call Sister Shufen, planning to go to the breeding farm together.
The two women each held a flashlight and carried a basket filled with quail eggs they had collected over the past few days.
"My goodness, so many!"
When Wang Shufen arrived at the farm, she was astonished to see several baskets full of quail eggs.
“There are more than 500 in total. Sister Shufen, thank you for your hard work today. We need to quickly pick out all the fertilized eggs and start incubating them this afternoon. The little quails will be born in half a month.”
"I'll be an employee here from now on, it won't be hard work."
Wang Shufen smiled and waved her hand.
The soldiers carried the quail eggs into the incubation room, and the two men, carrying flashlights, went inside.
After closing the door, the incubation room was plunged into darkness. The two turned on their flashlights and used them to illuminate the quail eggs.
This incubation room has no windows except for a door, and the thick earthen walls prevent any wind from getting in.
Lu Fangfang sat in the room, having just found a few fertilized quail eggs, when sweat began to pour from her forehead, and she couldn't stop wiping it away.
Holding a flashlight, she shone it on the thermometer hanging on the wall and saw that it was almost 30 degrees Celsius. She quickly opened the door a crack.
"Girl, this temperature is just right. When incubating the eggs, a little more heat will be enough. Just be careful at night, make sure it doesn't get cold."
Lu Fangfang nodded with a wry smile.
Sister Shufen is right. The temperature difference between day and night is large in this place, so we need to be more careful at night.
Seeing that Sister Shufen across from her was also sweating profusely, she felt a little guilty, after all, Sister Shufen wasn't an employee of the farm yet, but she had already started doing farm work.
After pondering for a while, Lu Fangfang made up her mind.
"Sister Shufen, I've made up my mind. Starting today, you'll be the egg-hatching technician at the farm!"
Wang Shufen was taken aback when she heard this. She looked up at her sister and felt that this was a bit of a joke.
"I'm a technician at a farm now? Girl, you're not kidding, are you?"
"Sister Shufen, I made a deal with the team leader before, that I would be in charge of the farm, and from now on you will be the farm's technician."
Lu Fangfang nodded vigorously, without a hint of joking.
"However, I need to discuss the salary with the team leader. Once our farm is up and running and making a profit, we can raise the salary."
She doesn't intend to just supply quail eggs to the troupe when she sets up this farm.
After expanding the scale, she plans to keep a portion for the group and sell the rest to increase the venue's profits, which will give her more confidence.
Of course, these are all future plans, and it's a bit early to talk about them now.
"So I'm a worker now? Girl, I have a job? And I'm a technician?"
Wang Shufen muttered to herself, still somewhat bewildered.
She had been a farmer for half her life, always making a living from the land, and never imagined that she would become a worker and earn a wage.
"Sis... Sis, am I dreaming?"
"Sister Shufen, it's not a dream, it's real! We'll all be employees of the farm from now on!"
Wang Shufen was stunned for a while before she came to her senses. She immediately grabbed a flashlight and excitedly shone it on the quail eggs.
She had to do this job well; from now on, she was a technician.
Outside the incubation room, Zhuang Mingcheng smiled and shook his head.
The wife's makeshift team has been assembled.
If we recruit more military spouses to help out, the farm can continue operating, which will solve two major problems for the regiment.
"Hao Dazhuang, count the people on our construction site, then go to Sandaogou Commune and buy each of them an ice pop and two 10-cent popsicles. Make sure they stay warm, so they don't melt."
Zhuang Mingcheng took the money out of his pocket and handed it to his messenger.
After buying popsicles, Zhuang Mingcheng took two palm-leaf fans, pushed open the door to the incubation room, and went inside.
"It's warm inside, what are you doing coming in?"
Lu Fangfang was busy, and she shone a flashlight on Zhuang Mingcheng.
"Let me fan you a bit to prevent you from getting heatstroke."
Zhuang Mingcheng held a palm-leaf fan in one hand and vigorously fanned the two of them.
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