Chapter 6 Chapter 6 Lice removal.
"Put the flour in the dough for making leaven. We'll make steamed buns tomorrow morning."
In order to make yeast for the cakes, she sterilized the ceramic basin and linen with boiling water, and then used the warm boiled water to mix the dough, and let the yeast in the air ferment it. Now that the weather is hot, she started mixing the dough at noon, and it would naturally ferment into yeast for the cakes by tomorrow morning.
"Don't open it."
It is important to make bread yeast free of bacteria.
Ji Xu took a hoe and prepared to go to Niupi Mountain to find some useful things before the sun set.
"Hey." Ji Feng squatted under the eaves and washed the dishes with soapberry.
She had eaten steamed cakes before. In the early years, when the family had not yet split up and was still relatively well-off, her grandmother would buy some wheat flour during the New Year, mix it with water to make wet flour, and use it to make steamed cakes. They were very chewy, but had to be eaten while hot, otherwise they would become hard when cooled.
But, what is bread yeast? I have never heard of bread yeast being used in making steamed cakes in the surrounding area.
Thinking of this, Ji Feng was looking forward to Ming Dynasty's steamed cakes.
"My head itches."
Jizhu was also preparing to go to the mountains to pick up pine cones. When she was about to carry the basket, she scratched her head uncomfortably.
"It must be head lice biting you." Ji Feng wiped her hands after washing the dishes. "Second sister will catch the lice for you."
Lice?
Ji Xu was surprised for a moment and then calmed down.
It's no wonder that Ji Feng is not surprised. Lice are common nowadays. Most households in the countryside raise poultry, and the lice on poultry can easily infect humans.
Another thing is that boiling water for washing is useless firewood. Firewood can be sold, but it is difficult to cut, so people are used to using it sparingly.
In summer, you can still use cold water; in winter, it is even more difficult to wash. The rich and powerful can still take a bath, but the common people do not have the conditions and do not have a decent bathroom. Take their family for example, they still wash in a low shed built behind the house, which does not even have a thatched roof to block the wind and rain.
Otherwise, how could there be the saying "Sitting in the courtyard in winter, taking off clothes and fur coats to catch lice in the sun"?
The two sisters were seen kneeling under the eaves, one in front and one behind. Ji Feng untied Ji Zhu's bun and pinched a louse with her thumbnail.
"This fat one bit you and made you bleed." Ji Feng's fingernails were all bleeding.
"itch……"
"Second sister will help you catch them first. Eldest sister will find some grass and boil water to wash your hair. Washing several times a day can kill lice." Hygiene and cleanliness must be taken seriously.
After saying this, Ji Xu hurried to Niupi Mountain.
In fact, not only Ji Zhu needed to wash, she and Ji Feng also had to wash. The three of them slept in the same bed, and the lice must have taken root in their heads.
It's not itchy at the moment, just not biting.
"I'm going to pick up pine cones." Ji Zhu thought about picking up pine cones every day.
"You stay home."
Ji Xu, who had not yet walked far, said.
Ji Feng continued to help her catch them.
After catching the snakes, her head felt itchy, so she asked Jizhu to help her.
"They must have bitten me because they saw me pinching their relatives."
But when Jizhu finally managed to find one, she would always let it slip away.
"Oh, I can't catch it..."
Ji Feng went into the house and got a bamboo comb with broken teeth. She stood in front of the house and combed out a lot of white nits.
Ji Xu was looking for a kind of grass called Tianmingjing. He had a vague impression of it when he went into the mountains to cut bamboo yesterday.
Now I carry a hoe and look for it along the way.
Sure enough, she found it. The herb was easy to identify, with many branches and broad, oval leaves with irregular serrations along the edges and short, downy hairs. Also called ground cabbage, it not only kills insects but also clears heat and resolves phlegm, and can be used as a compress to stop bleeding.
She dug up half a basketful of rice, and dried the remaining rice and stored it for future use.
I came across two wild pepper plants and a small bunch of wild onions, which was a pleasant surprise. I dug them up and put them in a basket, ready to take them back to plant.
While picking wild yellow gardenias.
"Mrs. Jin, with her ruthless knives, has chopped down all the bamboo.
Why don't you move this mountain to your home? "
Hearing the cursing, Ji Xu went closer to look at the clump of bamboo. There used to be more than twenty bamboos, but now there was not a single bamboo left. Only some bamboo roots and three or two bamboo basket sections remained on the mountain.
"I want to be a bamboo that doesn't even have a carrying pole!"
The woman was carrying a vegetable basket with some freshly picked vegetables in it, and an axe in it. She had come to cut bamboo to make a shoulder pole, but she went back empty-handed.
In fact, Ji Xu also wanted to cut some bamboo. Although there was no suitable bamboo to make a bamboo steamer, it would not be a big deal to cut the older bamboo to weave two baskets for his own use.
Seeing this, Ji Xu carried the basket on his back and went down the mountain. He picked some willow branches by the river, which could be used to weave a shoulder basket. With the shoulder basket, he could sell steamed cakes tomorrow.
Willow twigs can also be chewed in the morning and evening and used as a toothbrush.
In the Western Han Dynasty, there were toothbrushes made of bronze and pig bristles, but they were very rare. She had never seen anyone selling toothbrushes in the countryside. People in the countryside mostly used clean water to clean their teeth, and the wealthy would buy bamboo salt.
The upper class used cattail and water caltrop to clean their teeth, and there was also a regulation that Shangshulang had to contain "chicken tongue incense" when reporting to the emperor.
I can’t afford bamboo salt and spices for the time being, but I can find willow twigs anywhere.
Ji Zhu's head lice really sounded the alarm for Ji Xu's hygiene.
She went home and boiled water with Tianmingjing, diluted it with cold water, and asked Jizhu to come over and wash her hair in front of the house.
There is a quarrel next door.
It was Lai, the woman who had returned empty-handed from cutting bamboo, who came and cursed in the main courtyard with her hands on her hips.
"Mrs. Jin, you are such a rat! You really think that mountain belongs to you and your family!
"Give me the bamboo quickly! Otherwise I will report you to the village treasurer for monopolizing all the bamboo in the village!"
Jin was tired from cutting bamboo for half a day and started arguing with her.
"The village headman didn't stipulate how many bamboos I could cut! I'm also a registered resident of Benguli, so why can't I cut down the bamboos on Niupi Mountain?
Go, go, go! If you want to make a shoulder pole, go find it on another hill. It would be much easier if you come to my house and find one that is good!
In the second house, Ji Xu washed the hair of his two younger sisters and took the water to the bathroom. Ji Feng came to give Ji Zhu a bath.
Ji Xu was planting wild peppers and onions behind the house, accompanied by the quarreling sounds from next door.
The bathroom was submerged, and Ji Feng sighed, "Sister! Xiaozhu must be covered in two pounds of mud!"
When it was Ji Feng's turn, Ji Xu wanted to rub it for her, but Ji Feng was shy and wanted to rub it herself.
"Wipe it clean, especially behind the ears, arms and legs." Ji Xu reminded.
"I know. You have to rub it until it neither gathers into droplets nor falls down in strands." Ji Feng nodded repeatedly with a red face. While repeating her words, she pushed Ji Xu out of the bathroom.
During this period, one bucket of water was not enough, so Ji Xu moved the pottery pot to pour warm water for her. Ji Feng asked him to put it outside and asked Ji Xu to stay away from her before she reached out from under the straw curtain to bring it in.
After planting the peppers and onions, Ji Xu swept the house inside and out. It was only one room, so it didn't take much time. He then took the straw mat to the well to wash it, hung it outside to dry overnight, and slept on the bed tonight.
By the time Ji Xu finished washing his hair and taking a bath and was wringing his hair in the house, it was already dark.
The quarrel next door had just stopped when Lai came out of the main room carrying a bamboo stick. Jin was cursing behind her back, complaining that the handful of leek stems Lai gave her was too little.
"I worked so hard to cut and trim the bamboo branches and carry them back, and this lazy woman only gave me this little." Jin walked into the yard while picking her teeth.
Ji Yuan said, "Mom should have given it to her long ago. The noise was so loud that the neighbors knew we were cutting bamboo to make bamboo steamers."
"How can I let that shrew take advantage of me, your mother?"
Ever since Tian Guinu overturned her canal boat in the Mian River and was fed to the fish, no one has been able to scold Jin Cuiru better than her or get any benefit from her.
Not long after, Jin quietly took out a round object with a lid from her chest. With the help of the lit torch, she could see that the object in her hand was the bamboo steamer that Ji Xu had sold in the market that morning.
But she would not buy this to give money to the second wife. This was something she borrowed from someone else and was thinking about it.
That night, the pine trees in the eldest house were bright all night long. Jin was so tired that she couldn't make the bamboo steamer exactly as she had planned.
The simple horizontal and vertical veins, but the broken bamboo strips, had Jin stumped for the entire night. She knew how to weave mats with reeds, and had thought she'd figure out how to make a bamboo steamer once she figured it out, but when she actually did it, it was completely different...
In the end, five bamboo brooms were roughly made. The eldest daughter Ji Yuan had already fallen asleep on the wooden couch.
A broom would be fine too, as she saw that the witch could sell a broom for five cents.
Besides, all the bamboos near Niupi Mountain had been cut down by her, and Ji Xu didn't know when she would be able to find the ownerless bamboos.
This money should be earned by the eldest wife.
"Stop girl." She went to the next room and woke up her second daughter. "Mother has a task for you."
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