Chapter 060 Synthetic Essential Oils
After leaving Sister Bao's house, Wen Jiajia stopped shopping and followed the path to the halfway point of the North Mountain, where she could actually see a few tender green shepherd's purse seedlings.
Shepherd's purse is hidden under rotten dead leaves. You have to lift up the leaves to see its tender green.
It can be seen that the weather is gradually getting warmer. The human body cannot sense it for the time being, but the fragile, green new life can capture the breath of spring.
Wen Jiajia looked at it with joy, but the seedlings were still tender, only as tall as her little finger, and they needed to grow a little longer before they could be eaten.
Climbing higher, she reached an area she had never been to before and saw two locust trees.
This is Robinia pseudoacacia, the tree whose flowers are edible. It blooms in late spring and early summer. The flowers are white, with drooping inflorescences and petals that look like white butterflies. From a distance, they look like white bells.
Wen Jiajia loved to buy it to make fried eggs all her life, but the locust flowers bought from the supermarket didn't taste good, so when she wanted to eat it, she had to get up early and go to the market to buy it.
Going further ahead, I saw the spring bamboo shoots popping up, but they were only tiny tips.
This is a small bamboo forest. After a whole autumn and winter, the bamboos are still green. Most of the bamboos in the forest are bitter bamboos. Wen Jiajia noted the location and decided to come back to pick bitter bamboo shoots in a month or two.
Although bitter bamboo shoots have a bitter taste, they taste very good after being blanched in water and fried with wine lees and sweet potato flour until they become sticky.
Keep going up and you will reach the top.
Wen Jiajia stopped climbing and walked eastward, planning to reach the back of her home before going down the mountain.
Halfway through the walk, we encountered a mountain wall with some water seeping onto it. It was exactly the same as the mountain wall in the vegetable garden at my hometown.
The water gathers into a thin stream, flows into the ditch at the foot of the mountain, and then flows into the lake along the ditch.
If Wei Dai were here, he would definitely come over and cup his hands together to catch the water and drink it. But Wen Jiajia didn't dare to do that. The water was definitely delicious, but it also contained microorganisms that were invisible to the naked eye.
However, this water can be used to make tea. As for tea, it is best to use mountain spring water that has been filtered through layers of sand and gravel. It also contains trace elements and tastes sweet. The tea brewed with it will be much more fragrant than tea brewed with ordinary water.
Wen Jiajia memorized the location again. If she remembered correctly, there were two wild tea trees nearby, from which they had picked tea last year.
I spent half the morning here and it was almost noon when I got home.
Wei Dai was heating up the food when he heard Jia Jia come back and asked, "Did you go to the back hill?"
"How do you know?" Wen Jiajia sat on a chair by the door, took off her shoes, and asked Wei Dai to help her get the slippers in the room.
The slippers were crocheted with wool, of course, only the upper and the lining were crocheted with wool, and the soles were made of rubber soles that she bought from the department store.
She always wore these shoes when she was at home in the winter, and they were no worse than the plush slippers she wore decades later.
Wei Dai pointed to the footprints left on the bluestone slabs in the yard and said, "Where else could there be so much mud and grass except from the mountains?"
Wen Jiajia smiled and said, "You know what, I found a lot of good things when I went back to the mountain this time. I calculated the time. I can pick shepherd's purse in half a month, dig spring bamboo shoots in a month, pick bitter bamboo shoots in two months, and pick locust flowers in three months... Oh, I also saw wolfberry sprouts, but not much, just enough for two or three meals."
Wei Dai put the slippers at her feet and said, "You must seize the opportunity. The family members who have lived in the mountains for many years know everything about what is there."
That’s right! She would go wandering around the mountains and remember the coordinates of wild vegetables. Others would do the same.
Wen Jiajia put on a stern face, took out a pen and made a note on the calendar.
Wei Dai laughed: "Aren't the vegetables at home enough for you? Can wild vegetables be as delicious as the tender and juicy Chinese cabbage?"
Of course not! You are an ignorant person. Do you know that wild vegetables will be sold for tens of yuan per pound in a few decades?
Besides, the taste of wild vegetables is really different from those grown at home. They seem to have a more natural flavor.
Wei Dai said, "That's because you added a lot of oil and used bacon and eggs as side dishes, so of course it tastes good."
If you see wild onions growing out of the corner of the yard, you have to fry them with eggs. If you see scallions from the mountains, you have to stir-fry them with bacon.
If there is no bacon at home, she has to buy pork belly. But she still thinks the pork belly is not tasty enough and it is a waste of the leeks she picked specially.
Wen Jiajia had nothing to say and decided not to argue with him. Men just like to talk too much.
She slipped on her slippers and went to the kitchen to look.
In the pot, there was half a fish, half a bowl of braised pork with preserved vegetables, and some leftover winter amaranth soup from the morning. On the cutting board was spinach, which had been washed and was waiting to be steamed before being stir-fried.
"Where are the two sisters?" Wen Jiajia was about to call them for dinner.
Wei Dai: "They are playing basketball in the family building. Don't go and call them. They will come back to eat when it's time."
It's almost half past eleven, and they will come back naturally after the other children are called home for dinner.
When the meal was served, Wen Jiajia looked at the half-cooked fish and felt a little sorry: "Fish shouldn't be heated. In this weather, jelly fish is the best."
It's just like eating ice cream in front of a fire in the middle of winter. Not to mention the taste, it's really cool.
Wei Dai: "Do you like it? Use the two fish in the water tank to make fish soup, so that there will be more fish jelly." Wei Dai, who lives by the river, also likes to eat fish jelly.
Wen Jiajia swallowed her saliva: "One is original flavor, and the other is hot and sour! Both contain tofu."
"Okay." He laughed. Wen Jiajia really loved cooking tofu in fish soup.
When they had almost finished eating, Wen Chun and Wen Xuan came back panting.
"Wash your hands and have dinner." Wen Jiajia asked the two people again, "Who are you playing ball with?"
Wen Chun put the basketball on the shelf in the corner of the living room and ran to the kitchen while saying, "With Xiaopang and the others, Xiaopang finally came out to play with us, so we played longer."
Wen Jiajia was surprised, "That's good, it means my body is completely healed."
In fact, he had recovered a long time ago, but Xiaopang's grandmother was still worried and kept him at home. Recently, many children had fever and cough, so she dared not let Xiaopang out.
But today is New Year's Day, a brand new year, and it would not be appropriate to be restrained any longer.
Wei Dai served the two children some rice, and when he was done he came back and asked her, "How did the issue between his family and Sister Hong's family get resolved?"
How did you solve it? How else can you solve it? Just let it go. Sister Hong didn't sell the red medicine to Xiaopang's family. Xiaopang's parents were very reasonable. After the doctor said it was okay, they didn't pursue it anymore.
But Sister Hong's business was over. I heard that the logistics department came to her house and strictly ordered her not to bring these things back to exchange with other people in the family compound.
But Sister Hong is an unyielding and strong woman... Well, Sister Bao said she is still a villain with a stubborn mind.
Sister Hong has started growing mushrooms again recently. A few days ago, she came to ask Wen Jiajia if there were any lime trees on the hill behind her house, as lime trees are good for growing shiitake mushrooms and black fungus.
She didn't plan to sell the mushrooms and fungus she raised, as that would be too stupid and easy for someone to catch her. Instead, she traded them for eggs and other things, and no one could say anything about it.
But Wen Jiajia was very confused. How could she guarantee that she could grow mushrooms and black fungus, and how could she guarantee that the mushrooms and black fungus would not be picked by others?
Wei Dai picked up a piece of fish belly meat and put it in Wen Jiajia's bowl. "Who would have known that you ate this piece of fish. You are such a fool. You are afraid to pick bones when you have fish to eat."
They are afraid of the thorns and simply refuse to eat them. This kind of behavior would have starved to death ten years ago.
He remembered that during the three years of food shortage, he basically relied on the fish in the river to survive. At first it was OK, but in the end the fish were almost eaten to extinction, and it took five or six years to raise enough fish.
Wen Jiajia picked out the big bones and ate the last bit of rice in the bowl with the fish.
——
How many days does the Spring Festival holiday last? 3 days.
New Year’s Eve, New Year’s Day, and New Year’s Day.
As for the 28th and 29th, they are weekends. This year they happen to fall on weekends, so we can have a five-day holiday.
So when she was still enjoying the New Year, the holiday came to an abrupt end and she had to go back to work.
Wen Jiajia often hesitates between lying down and making progress because of this damn work system - there are really no holidays these days!
When she returned to work, she clearly felt that the atmosphere in the factory was different. It seemed that wherever she went, people were discussing the new factory.
"Is it really a glass factory? Hey, doesn't our city already have a glass factory? Why don't we let them do it?"
"You are stupid. What kind of glass do we use? It is pharmaceutical glass. They can make canning glass and window glass, but can they make ampoules? Can they make ampoules of various models?"
"...then they can add another production line. They are all made of glass anyway, so they will definitely be able to get started faster than us."
"Who knows? Maybe they can't get a production line, or maybe our factory got there first. Alas, I don't know how many people the new factory can hire. My son is still at home, making paper boxes every day. If he doesn't find a job, he will be forced to go to the countryside."
"However, this new factory is said to be built together with the chemical factory, but I heard that its parent unit is the Municipal Industry Bureau."
"No, it was originally to be given to the Provincial Fuel Chemical Industry Bureau, but then somehow it was given to the Municipal Industry Bureau. He is the old leader of the chemical plant... In this way, he is actually the flesh and blood of the family, and our pharmaceutical factory is like a stepmother."
"Haha, that's right! The Municipal Bureau of Industry, the Chemical Plant, the Pharmaceutical Glass Plant, that's three generations of ancestors and grandchildren. I think our pharmaceutical factory will be kicked out sooner or later."
"Well. If you can think of the problem, how can the factory leader not think of it? They must have a trick up their sleeve."
"Then let you go, will you go?"
"I won't go! I'm doing well in the factory. Why would I go there if they don't give me a raise?"
Wen Jiajia happened to be writing on the promotional board. She had almost finished when she heard these words. She waited until the other person finished speaking before she got up from the stool and went back to the office.
"This job is simple. All you have to do is copy some medicine-related content onto the promotional board every day." Wen Jiajia brushed the dust off his hands and said to the newcomer.
The girl who replaced Shayue was a girl named Dong Qi who just graduated from high school last year. She wore two braids that reached down to her collarbone and had two bows tied on the braids with a light yellow headband. She looked very youthful and pretty.
Dong Qi smiled and nodded: "Okay Sister Wen!"
"You should just call me Jia Jia."
"What about Sister Jiajia?"
Wen Jiajia: “…That’s fine.” She sounds younger than “Sister Wen” anyway.
Sha Yue’s personal belongings had been cleared out, and those that were inconvenient to take away were placed with Wen Jiajia.
Dong Qi's parents are old employees of the research institute where Feng Yu works. Her elder sister was in poor health and did not go to the countryside, so she was originally going to go, but had been putting it off until now. Just when she was about to be recruited, this OEM job was like a life-saving straw, and she grabbed it tightly.
So the main purpose of this girl coming here is to see if there are any job opportunities, even working in the cafeteria is no problem.
Wen Jiajia knew that Sha Yue and her husband had a good relationship with the other person's parents, so she took her with her to lunch. On the way, she curiously asked her, "Can't your parents find you a job in the institute?"
Dong Qi said without hiding anything, "It's not convenient for my parents because they might be reported."
Wen Jiajia understood immediately. Intellectuals, high-level intellectuals at that, were indeed a bit dangerous at this time.
So this girl can only rely on herself. If she can find a job, she will find one. If she can't find one, she will have to go to the countryside.
Wen Jiajia, who had worked as a farmer in the countryside for a few months, thought that if she were to be born in the body of these young city dwellers, they would most likely insist on staying in the city, even to clean the toilet rather than go to the countryside.
Farm work is really not that easy.
After training this girl for a day, on the second day, she had obviously gotten the hang of it and could write the content of the promotional column independently.
On the third day, I started helping to organize some data.
On the fourth day, I followed Wen Jiajia to the workshop and had a lively conversation with the workers there.
Wen Jiajia felt that this girl was really talented. After fucking her for half a month, she might be even more capable than Sha Yue.
Even Director Xue noticed her, and from then on he became even more displeased with Li Haijun.
Even the girl who works for others is better than him.
Why is it called an iron rice bowl? It is because no matter how incompetent you are, the factory cannot fire you.
At most, you will be transferred to another position, for example, from the workshop to logistics.
It's okay if he can't do the work in the workshop, but can he not do the work in logistics as well?
Therefore, jobs these days are too stable and too hard to find.
After learning that the factory in Fengliu Street had started construction, Wen Jiajia asked Dong Qi to keep an eye out for news about the new factory.
"It's hard to get a job at a pharmaceutical factory. According to past practice, they won't start recruiting until mid-May at the earliest," said Wen Jiajia. "It's better to focus on the new factory."
"When will the new factory be built?" Dong Qi asked.
Wen Jiajia thought for a moment and said, "I have to go and see it first to know."
She was also very curious.
It will probably be built soon, because the new factory is not built from scratch, but is converted from the site of an old hospital, which means it can be used after renovation.
So the next day at noon, after lunch, Wen Jiajia rode her bike to Fengliu Street.
This street is much quieter than the street where the pharmaceutical factory is located. After all, it is a pharmaceutical factory, and with thousands of employees, it is naturally bustling with people coming and going.
There were already people in the new factory, coming in and out, and from time to time trucks carrying a lot of stuff went in and left through the back door.
Wen Jiajia came to the gate and asked the gatekeeper: "Master, I work for the pharmaceutical factory next door. Do you know when our new factory will be completed?"
"How would we know? It will probably be after the middle of the year at the earliest," said the eldest brother.
"What's taking so long?"
"Of course not! It was originally a hospital, and the rooms are not very big. Don't you need to break down some walls? Then there are the machines. Some have arrived and some have not. Many of them still need people to help install. It will take at least five months." This is what the eldest grandfather said.
Wen Jiajia: "Is that so? How about recruiting people?"
The old man laughed out loud: "You are so funny, girl. I am a security guard, not a factory manager. I don't know what you are asking me."
“…”
Well, she was presumptuous.
Wen Jiajia returned to the pharmaceutical factory and told Dong Qi about this, and Dong Qi breathed a sigh of relief.
She smiled and said, "Sister Shayue said she won't be able to come back to work until July or August at the latest."
"What's taking so long?"
"Yes! We have to wait until the child is older."
Wen Jiajia counted on her fingers and realized that it was true. No matter what, she had to wait until the child was three or four months old before she could go out safely.
Perhaps because of this big event, the working atmosphere in the factory continued to improve.
There is a big clock in the center of the pharmaceutical factory. The hands of the clock turn day after day, and in the blink of an eye, it is spring and flowers are blooming.
Ginkgo trees have sprouted new buds, and from a distance they are all green. Not only have the lawns on the roadside turned green, but wild flowers have also sprouted. Their frail bodies sway in the wind, showing how vigorous their vitality is at every moment.
This is the case inside the city, and even more so outside the city.
Wen Jiajia feels it the most deeply. Every day on her way to and from get off work, she always sees new lives being born on the roadside.
For example, peach blossoms, which would bloom around the tenth day of the first lunar month in my hometown, will not bloom here until the Spring Equinox.
The hillside is covered with pink and white peach and apricot blossoms, which are very beautiful.
Wen Jiajia memorized the location and decided to wait for the peach tree to bear fruit. She would then see if the fruit was edible after it was ripe.
I really want to eat peaches.
There are also various wild vegetables.
After the spring rain, wild vegetables rushed out of the soil and stretched out their leaves.
This is a temptation for many people, especially those who work every day.
Every day you can see wild vegetables sprouting on the hillside. If you don’t pick them, they will slowly get old.
After all, this place is far from the village, and the villagers pick wild vegetables around their own village.
Wen Jiajia thought this was a huge waste, so she went to the factory to spread the word. Before long, everyone in the factory knew that there was a hillside in the suburbs where there were a lot of wild vegetables to pick!
Don’t think that city people look down on wild vegetables from the mountains. Vegetables in the city also cost money. If possible, they would like to pick wild vegetables every day.
Then Wen Jiajia discovered that every day after lunch, there were always groups of workers riding bicycles out.
Where to go? To the suburbs.
When it was almost time to go to work, they came back in twos and threes, with the front baskets of their bicycles full of green wild vegetables.
Shepherd's purse, dandelion, mint, wild onion, chrysanthemum...
Wen Jiajia was amazed! She actually knew very little about wild vegetables. Apart from the commonly eaten wild vegetables such as shepherd's purse, wild onion and fern, she didn't know the others, let alone how to eat them.
"How else can you eat it? Just blanch it in water and serve it cold!" said a colleague in the workshop. "You can also cook it in soup. As long as the smell is not too strong, you can cook it in soup."
As he spoke, he gave her a few examples, and Wen Jiajia quickly took a pen and wrote them down.
The wild vegetable season lasts for a long time, and Wen Jiajia has spent her rest days in the past few months looking for wild vegetables.
Why? She discovered the magical uses of wild vegetables.
It doesn't mean eating wild vegetables after drying them when they are out of season, but she discovered that this thing can actually be synthesized.
This was a bit of a surprise. She went to the back mountain to pick shepherd's purse some time ago and tried to synthesize it on a whim. She thought it would probably fail and didn't take it seriously. But then she came across the option of "sitosterol".
After all, Wen Jiajia had worked in a pharmaceutical factory. Even if she worked in an office, she would naturally know what steroid compounds are through osmosis.
In addition, her father suffers from cholesterol, so she knows the benefits of sitosterol.
It can not only lower serum cholesterol, but also prevent atherosclerosis.
Wen Jiajia tried to click on the synthesis button, and three seconds later, yellow-brown powder appeared on her hand.
Not much, just a handful.
But this is enough to make her excited. What opportunity caused the qualitative change of Golden Finger?
She observed for a long time before she discovered that there was a progress bar at the bottom of the light screen. The progress bar was now basically at the starting point, which meant that the previous stage had been completed and it had officially entered the second stage.
Perhaps it is for this reason that she is able to synthesize plants.
Wen Jiajia was very happy, but she suppressed her excitement and waited until the next time she could synthesize other plants. By the time she had tried almost all the plants in the back mountain, two months had passed.
Her mood had long since calmed down. In her opinion, synthesis machines were more practical, because plants could always produce some strange things, including medicines and poisons, and there were also many chemicals that she couldn't understand. So no matter how curious she was, she didn't dare to synthesize them, for fear of being caught and jailed, or being poisoned to death.
I am even more afraid that the wind might accidentally blow me and poison someone to death.
But synthetic essential oils are fine.
Spring and summer are the flower seasons. The roses in the back mountain are in bloom. Wen Jiajia spent two months to produce two bottles of rose essential oil.
The scent of rose essential oil is very similar to that of rose, only slightly inferior.
But this was enough. Wen Jiajia applied rose essential oil on her body, and sure enough, the two girls gathered around her and sniffed, saying "it smells so good".
How could it not smell good? The flowers of two rose trees only produce about 100 ml of essential oil.
This is pure rose essential oil. After a few decades, it will be sold for at least a thousand yuan.
Once she gets some popular essential oils like lavender and rose, selling them for three or four thousand won’t be a problem!
Wen Jiajia's breathing became rapid. Great, there was one more way to make money.
It was officially May and Wei Dai had been away from home for two whole months.
He left in early March, saying he was on a mission.
He didn't say what the mission was, and Wen Jiajia didn't ask. Wei Dai only said that the mission would take a long time. Not only did he leave, but Xie Yang next door was also nowhere to be seen.
Wen Jiajia thought that "long" meant one month, but who knew it was two months.
And there was no news at all, which prompted Wen Jiajia to go to the logistics department to ask every now and then.
Fearing that Wei Dai was injured or something, the troops did not dare to tell her.
The logistics department could not provide an answer, so Wen Jiajia could only sigh at home and even lost interest in synthetic essential oils.
When the weather gradually got warmer, she finally came out of this mood.
There was no other way. The thick quilts at home had to be put out in the sun. And the straw mats needed to be washed and brushed. Even the straw mattress had to be taken out and exposed to the sun for a few days.
The good news is that Wen Chun and Wen Xuan haven't wet the bed in the past six months. Wen Jiajia doesn't need to weave new straw mats for them, nor does she need to take apart the cotton and re-stuff it, which saves her a lot of effort.
Amidst the busyness, the weather was getting hotter and hotter, and she felt it was even hotter than last year.
Peaches also ripened during this period, but unfortunately they were not even half the size of her fist, and were so sour that they were inedible.
This is normal. If it were edible, it would have been transplanted to the village by nearby villagers long ago. There is no way it would have been preserved until now.
Wen Jiajia thought and thought but couldn't come up with any good way to deal with these sour peaches, so she gave up regretfully and turned to pick apricots next to them.
Although apricots are bitter, they are still edible after being pickled. There are also waxberries. Wen Jiajia brought a basket of waxberries to visit Shayue that day.
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