Year 1979: Eating meat with my wife and children

What a touching display of filial piety!

Li Xiangdong and A Zhe clicked their tongues, neither of them knowing how to start the conversation.

In the end, the two of them said nothing and carried the sacks onto the tricycle.

Hou San glanced at the two of them and felt that they were very strange. He, Hou Laosan, was so filial, so why didn't the two of them say a word of praise to him?

When the tricycle passed near the department store, Li Xiangdong asked the tricycle driver to stop.

"Wait for me a moment, I'm going to buy something and I'll be right back."

After finishing his sentence, Li Xiangdong walked quickly towards the department store, where he stood at the entrance looking around.

After watching for a while, he noticed a young man wearing a military green uniform and carrying a cloth bag. He would occasionally lean over to passersby and whisper a few words to them.

We've finally found it!

He strode over and patted the young man on the shoulder, but the young man turned and ran!

Li Xiangdong tugged at the strap of his satchel and said in a low voice, "I'm not here to arrest you, why are you running? Do you have a shoe ticket?"

After realizing it wasn't an undercover officer, the young man complained, "Dude, can you please stop tapping me on the shoulder from behind? You almost scared me to death!"

"Stop dawdling, do you have a shoe ticket?"

Li Xiangdong didn't have time to banter with him. The plainclothes officers weren't just arresting ticket scalpers; if they found any, both buyers and sellers would be taken away.

"Look at what you're saying! Of course I have shoe tickets. How many do you want?"

"Two."

"Four yuan, payment first, ticket later."

"Are you robbing someone in broad daylight?"

"Do you have tickets? Yes, I do. I can decide how much to sell them for. Besides, buddy, I'm taking a risk."

"Alright, stop arguing and give me two."

Li Xiangdong took out his money, and the young ticket scalper took out two shoe tickets from his cloth bag.

Payment first, goods later. Li Xiangdong checked the receipts and, finding no problems, asked again, "Do you have receipts for the milk powder?"

"Wow~ a milk powder coupon?"

When the young ticket scalper heard about milk powder coupons, he was first surprised, then deflated, "We don't have any."

"You're such a drama queen!"

Li Xiangdong almost couldn't help but curse. He ignored the young ticket scalper and turned to walk quickly into the department store.

Two pairs of leather shoes, along with receipts and money, were all used up in one go, covering the entire twenty yuan bonus from the company.

The tricycle driver pedaled hard, and Hou San, sitting in the back, stared at Li Xiangdong's bulging cloth bag and asked, "Brother Dong, what did you buy? Let us see."

"Study materials".

Li Xiangdong casually made up a story, not wanting Hou San to know that he was imitating him, otherwise Hou San would be too proud of himself.

A-Zhe didn't believe him, but Hou-San took it seriously.

"Dong-ge, why did you buy study materials?"

"Go to university, do scientific research, and go find your third brother to accompany you in contributing to the country."

"Ah~"

Hou San was dumbfounded. He thought to himself, "It's over. I finally made a friend, and now I'll never see him again."

Ah Zhe laughed and said, "Hou San, you don't really believe that, do you? When the three of us split the money, Dongzi would calculate every few hundred yuan on paper. If he could go into scientific research, the two of us could go to Tsinghua or Peking University."

Hou San scratched his head and chuckled, "Brother Dong, so you were just teasing me."

The three chatted as they arrived at A-Zhe's house; the money hadn't been divided yet.

Ah Zhe took out a piece of paper and a pen from the house. "Li Kexue, calculate carefully. Don't shortchange us!"

"Fuck off!"

Li Xiangdong blushed slightly, picked up a pen, and began to calculate on the paper.

“This time we made 960 yuan. After deducting the 150 yuan cost, we have 810 yuan left. You two each get 20%, so that's 162 yuan each. I'll round it up to 170 yuan each.”

After dividing the money between the two, Li Xiangdong had 470 yuan left. He then gave A Zhe 20 yuan to cover the expenses of the three of them.

After the money was divided, and seeing that it was almost 5 p.m., Li Xiangdong and Hou San said goodbye and left.

When Hou San passed by Li Xiangdong's house, he went in and petted the dog for half an hour. He didn't eat dinner at Li Xiangdong's house because his family knew he was coming back today. If he didn't come home for dinner, he would definitely get a beating that night.

"Come inside with me."

After Hou Sanyi left, Zhou Yuqin handed her daughter to Li's mother and took Li Xiangdong back to her west wing.

Li Xiangdong looked at Zhou Yuqin, who was locking the door, and laughed, "You're getting more and more outrageous. It's not even dark yet. I know you're in a hurry, but can't you wait until the children are asleep at night?"

"Ok?"

Zhou Yuqin's mind raced for a moment before she realized what he was talking about. She walked over and punched Li Xiangdong twice, then opened the satchel on the table.

"gourd?"

She smelled alcohol and asked, "Is this a bar?"

Li Xiangdong rubbed his stomach. "Yeah, someone gave it to me. Let me tell you, go easy on me next time!"

"Serves you right, who told you to say those shameful things?"

As Zhou Yuqin spoke, she took out a wine gourd from her satchel and placed it on the table, only then noticing the two pairs of leather shoes underneath.

After taking out the leather shoes, she excitedly asked, "Did someone else give me these too?"

Li Xiangdong lay lazily on the kang (a heated brick bed) and replied, "What are you dreaming about? I bought these leather shoes at the department store. One pair is for you, and the other pair is for my mother."

Zhou Yuqin looked at the two pairs of leather shoes to see how big they were. After choosing her pair, she didn't rush to wear them. Instead, she asked, "How much did you pay for these two pairs of leather shoes?"

"twenty."

"Don't buy it again, it's too expensive."

Zhou Yuqin has changed somewhat. When she heard that two pairs of leather shoes cost twenty yuan, she didn't react strongly. She just told Li Xiangdong not to buy them again next time.

No matter how good the leather shoes are, they are not as important as counting money. Zhou Yuqin put away her leather shoes and began to count the money one bill at a time.

"Count them yourself, I'll go take the leather shoes to my mother."

Li Xiangdong got up, took the pair of leather shoes he had bought for his mother, opened the door and went out. Zhou Yuqin followed closely behind and locked the door.

"Daddy...hug me..."

Li Xiaozhu, who was sitting in her mother's lap, saw Li Xiangdong enter the room and tried to stand up by pressing her mother's arms with both hands.

You'd better watch yourself.

Li Xiangdong took two steps forward and hugged his daughter, then waved the leather shoe in front of his mother.

"Try them on and see if they fit."

"You bought these for me? Why did you suddenly decide to buy me leather shoes? Are they genuine leather?"

Li's mother was overjoyed when she received the leather shoes. She never imagined that at her age, she could still be fashionable and wear leather shoes.

"I'll wash my feet tonight before wearing them."

"The shoes are in your hands now, you can decide what to do with them."

Li Xiangdong didn't rush back to the house to eat. He pulled out a long bench from under the table, sat down, and started chatting with his grandparents.

Only after Li's father and his two companions, who were at work, and Li Xiaojiang and others, who were at school, returned home did he pick up his daughter and prepare to go back to his room.

"Uncle Three."

Li Xiaotao, who had just returned home, walked straight toward him before even putting his schoolbag back in the house.

Li Xiaotao stood in front of him and said softly, "Third Uncle, I didn't do well on my exam. Can you do me a favor?"