The three of them drank Huoxiang Zhengqi Water twice along the way and poured bottled water on their hats twice before finally arriving home safely.
The passing of their familiar neighbor today left Song Qiu'e and Xu Jiangming feeling very down.
It wasn't until Xu Lai returned home that Song Qiu'e, who was at home, simply cooked some vegetable noodles for everyone to eat before entering the space.
When the call came back at noon, the family had lunch in the space before leaving.
As soon as they stepped outside, a suffocating heat wave hit them. Xu Chao, quick-witted, turned on the standing air conditioner in the living room, while Xu Jiangming and the others hurriedly closed the living room windows and the doors leading to other rooms.
Before the air conditioner blew in, Xu Lai walked to the coffee table and picked up the thermometer on it to take a look.
"It's 48 degrees Celsius. I estimate the high will reach 50 degrees Celsius by 2 PM!"
As Xu Lai read out the temperature, she walked to the window, picked up the thermometer hanging outside, and looked at it: "Outdoor temperature: fifty degrees!"
Based on this, the temperature would reach approximately 55 degrees Celsius around 2 PM, the hottest time of the day.
"The temperature is a bit lower than yesterday!"
Xu Chao, who studied science and was relatively good with numbers, suddenly said something.
Although the temperature is lower than yesterday, the outdoor temperature is still over 50 degrees Celsius. People can die if they stay outside for too long.
"Hey, Grandpa Lu's family actually started selling ice cream bars in the neighborhood group chat this morning!"
Standing in front of the standing air conditioner, already enjoying the cool air, Xu Haiguo looked at his phone and excitedly said to everyone.
Old Master Xu, who had already pulled up a table and chair and sat down, was very happy for Old Master Lu's family and said, "This is indeed a good business!"
Xu Haiguo quickly scrolled through the chat history in the group and replied with a smile, "That's right. The Lu family posted a message in the group at 8:30 this morning about selling ice bricks, and in less than two minutes, their six 20-pound ice bricks were all sold out."
"Furthermore, the eight large ice cubes for the period after 4 PM have already been reserved!"
After hearing this, Xu Lai, Song Qiu'e, and Xu Chao also curiously took their phones out of their pockets and opened the community property management group to browse through them.
These ice cream bars are indeed a very popular and sought-after item.
Grandpa Lu sets the price at 6 centimeters per block for 20 kilograms, and offers a discounted price of 10 centimeters for two blocks.
This is the work points an ordinary worker earns in a day.
But people in the group even booked orders for a week later.
The Lu family in the group made a special statement: the number of ice bricks they produce per day is limited. Due to power supply issues, they can only sell ice bricks twice a day, with only eight ice bricks weighing twenty kilograms each time.
Xu Lai did a quick mental calculation and figured they could earn at least eighty work points that day.
"Earn eighty work points a day, eight hundred in ten days, and you can pay back the work points you owe the Xu family in twenty days!"
At the Lu family home, Old Master Lu couldn't stop smiling as he looked at the eight five-point cards and four ten-point cards on the coffee table.
"That's right! At this rate, our family can also take the opportunity to earn more work points and buy more food from the government supermarket!"
After hearing her husband's words, even the wrinkles on Old Mrs. Lu's brows relaxed considerably. She usually does most of the cooking at home.
Of the five members of this family, only the son works in a government department.
With his professional skills, he can earn 20 work points a day, twice that of an ordinary worker.
But there's a little granddaughter at home who needs special care and attention, and those twenty work points a day are simply not enough to make ends meet.
Moreover, because of the extreme heat, they had to buy solar power equipment and insulation, and their family still owed Brother Xu's family a huge sum of 1,500 work points!
This debt, coupled with daily household expenses, especially the dwindling food supply in the kitchen, kept her constantly on edge.
Now that they have this business, they can finally breathe a sigh of relief.
Looking at all those work point cards, Leng Jiajia didn't say anything, but the smile on her face never disappeared.
With this way of making money, my husband won't have to work so hard overtime for the government anymore.
My daughter An'an can now eat better and more nutritious meals every day.
She remembered her husband, Lu Ping, telling her on the phone a few days ago that working overtime every day could earn her extra overtime pay, one extra work point per hour.
Thinking of this, she disregarded the fact that it was her husband's work time, grabbed her phone, and dialed his number.
She needed to tell her husband the good news from home and make him happy too.
Around 3:50 p.m., with the government power supply to be cut off in ten minutes, the Xu and Xiao families, who were still enjoying the air conditioning in their living rooms, each received ice blocks personally carried over by Grandpa Lu.
Looking at the 20-pound square ice block, which resembled a giant piece of rock candy, Xu Lai couldn't help but reach out and touch it.
This was the first time in her life she had ever seen such a large block of ice.
The older generation, including Xu Jiangming, initially refused the ice bricks that Grandpa Lu had sent.
"Brother, I already have solar power generation equipment at home. It's a waste for you to send such a big piece over. Hurry up and take it back to sell for work points!"
Upon hearing what Old Master Xu said, Old Master Lu hurriedly placed the large block of ice, which was wrapped in a bag, on the Xu family's dining table and waved his hand to Old Master Xu, refusing the offer, saying, "Brother Xu, our Lu family has received so much help from you since this natural disaster broke out. What is this block of ice?"
After saying that, he quickened his pace to leave: "Brother Xu, I won't bother you any longer. It's almost four o'clock. After I deliver the other piece to Brother Xiao's house, the customers who ordered ice cream will be here soon!"
Before Xu Lai and the others could even speak to Grandpa Lu and the others, they saw him carrying another large block of ice out of his house.
Judging from the sound, they were knocking on the door of the Xiao family next door.
Xu Lai and the others did not waste the kindness of Grandpa Lu's family. Xu Lai took them directly into the space. Xu Lai found another clean plastic bag, wrapped the ice block, and placed it flat in the freezer of the space warehouse.
At four o'clock sharp, the government-supplied electricity was cut off on time. In order to save electricity from solar power, the family went into the space and came out when it got dark, and then took the ice bricks to the air-conditioned room to use.
I must say, with ice blocks in the air-conditioned room, the double cooling effect, plus the insulation cotton in the room, makes sleeping in it at night a truly rare treat.
Extreme weather continues to plague the entire country, and even the entire planet.
The high temperatures that have lasted for half a month have caused an unusually rapid increase in water evaporation, and the soil on the land outside has begun to dry out.
Even the large trees and other plants that barely survived the torrential rains and floods couldn't withstand the extreme heat and were all scorched to death.
?
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com